Happy New Year - Enhancements to the site underway for 2006.

As HowWasTheShow is still a Mom and Pop operation, we're not likely to wow you with major overnight overhauls, but here are a couple of enhancements we're working on so far for 2006.

• First and foremost, a people update: Andrea Myers has graciously accepted the position of Assistant Editor, and Zosia Blue has taken over as Photo of the Week editor. I feel lucky and grateful to have these two talented women in the "inner circle."
  
• As of the first of the year, we've implemented a database-driven Recommended Shows Calendar. There are still some tweaks to go (allow yourself to be re-directed and don't bookmark the destination yet because it may move) but each of our writers can now contributing show recommendations on-the-fly, so expect to see a more extensive and diverse selection of shows posted, and more frequent updates.
  
• I finally implemented the Google Search! It's only on the front page so far, and on some of the most recent articles, but it's there at long last. The old FusionBot search tool will disappear for good when I run the 2006 template update on the entire site sometime this week. One nice feature of the new search is it gives you the option of searching either this blog or the main site.
• A phpBB HowWasTheShow discussion board is also in the works where fans can contribute their own live reviews and miscellaneous thoughts about music and whatever. Want to jump right in and start yakking before the official rollout (and link from the main site)? Share your thoughts here.
• It's not been promoted much, but there is a mini Twin Cities Music Media Aggregator here. So far it's only pulling the last 4 articles from Ross Raihala's blog, and the major music articles from the Pioneer Press, City Pages and Star Tribune. But it is useful for a quick glance, and if you are a local music fan, you really need to be reading those four sources completely every week even if you don't read anything else. If you want to meet the king of the aggregators, it's the one at mnspeak.com.

Happy New Year to all, and thank you for the support and kindness you've shown by supporting howwastheshow in recent years as we share the things we're passionate about with you.