I've been working on that idea on more passive way and smaller scale http://www.doplaces.com http://www.doplaces.com A few things Ive added beyond the general

I've been working on that idea on more passive way and smaller scale http://www.doplaces.com http://www.doplaces.com A few things Ive added beyond the general what's nerby on touristy websites are: Group locations and meeting schedules, "points of interest" category for those who like to wander, adjustable date time to see what will be open during the time of their visit, notices to learn about pre-event tickets or signups for competitions and such ahead of time. The biggest issues I see is a)Advertising the service and b)Buy-in by the businesses/community groups/vendors and performers - unless you have some good traction already, you have to prove that it's worth their effort. On the advertising, my current plan is to make a programmatic "vendor printable" flyer they can print up and post - a simple sign "you are here [big X] find out what's nearby [QR coe and custom url for the business like "doplaces.com/near/BillsDiner"]. Reduces the effort to get results on the public side, goes right into what they want to see. Once you do have public buy in, the next problem is making quick updating painless for the participants... My site currently has no-login updating, I've made it about as simple as you can get (edit one text field - I'll deal with the hard input controls.) Not as much input as I expected... but also could be because I'm in the sticks, and mobile savvy audience is not as big as would be in a city. If I had the time, and doing it on a live scale, like you are thinking, I'd probably have a vendor-side mobile app where they could either turn on/off real time tracking or just be able to push a "ping" button to update their location/status (tied to their record of what they do) Incentive - might be able to provide them with metrics of popularity, competition density, peak time graphs, etc. Good Luck!