Cybergrass Bluegrass Music Website 20 Years Old Today

Cybergrass® - Bluegrass Music News web site celebrates 20 years on the web today. The site was one of the earliest to venture onto the Internet and with it came the first music site. Surprisingly, it was the small genre of bluegrass music that broke ground with the new World Wide Web technology. It would be over a year until the next music site would explore the new technology.

Bluegrass music was just one of the firsts that the site enjoyed. Working with Adam Curry's Metaverse back in the mid '90s, it was a Cybergrass Sun server and multiple ISDN lines that carried the first awards show -- the Grammys®. For the next 15 years, the bluegrass music site has carried the International Bluegrass Music Awards and has been the only site to have done so for every year the program has been available. The site will make that 16 years in a row in just a few weeks.

It has always been about the music, the artists and bluegrass in particular. The site focused on promotion of the genre and to bring more people to the genre who may not have been aware of it. It carried low-fidelity sound bites to help sell the music. The Digital Millenium Copyright Act ended that activity but also opened up other avenues to continue the promotion.

Early Perl script based databased managed a Want-Ads, Event Calendar and various surveys on the 2nd generation of the web site. Subsequent sites would use real database engines as the site evolved. Now in its 5th version, the site primarily focuses on bluegrass music news and has a syndicated feed updated every morning.

The site was the original home for many artists including the father of bluegrass music, Bill Monroe. The site had the first artist profiles for artists like Alison Krauss, Blue Highway and scores of others. At its peak, it was the home for over 50 different bluegrass artists where basic information, event schedules and other information was available.

As Artists, labels and others expanded onto the web, the site dropped those profile pages and focused more on the news of the day. The site has always followed the trend that the readership advocates. It follows, rather than trying to drive, the market. As interest evolves into other areas, the site will follow wherever the path leads.

Bluegrass music is alive and well on Cybergrass®. For readers looking for the latest major events, news and information relating to the genre, you will find Cybergrass a true, time tested, source of information. Bluegrass is definitely the little genre that could.

The site is owned and maintained by Bob Cherry who has been involved in technology since the mid '70s and he continues in that vein today.