GarageSpin

CROSSDOGS, a Christian artist booking service, will launch January 1 to begin connecting independent Christian bands with venues industry peeps including promoters, venues, churches, festivals, contests, agents, managers, merchandisers, producers, etc.

Membership costs bands $49.95, allowing bands to create an Electronic Dog Tag(TM) or EDT (an online press kit similar to what SonicBids provides) that they can send anywhere via email.

I like the idea of creating niche services to support niche genres.  However, I'm not sure I big fan of the policy that allows businesses to submit ads for free, and receive 50% of every submission fee.  I.e. artists are paying everyone's bills.  The policy could lead to abuse, if businesses begin encouraging massive submissions, just to reap submission fees.  On the other hand, it's a good way to grow a large venue base quickly (which is valuable for artists), and ensure venues aren't spammed with thousands of submissions for a single ad (a submission fee introduces a spam "barrier").

I look forward to seeing what the finalized rules/conditions/pricing models are in January -- I think there are genuine, good intentions driving it all, and hope the effort succeeds in helping artists book gigs.

UPDATE:  Brant Menswar, Co-Founder of CrossDogs, discusses the concerns I raised above, and clarifies some of CrossDog's policies in a comment to this post.  Check it out for more details -- for instance, all gigs are paying gigs, etc.  (Thanks for the comment, Brant!)  Good stuff.