I'm sure most of the IMT community is familiar with the crowdsourced spreadsheet that Gabriel Nijmeh created listing artists on Twitter. But, it's evolved a great deal since I first read about it. He now includes music bloggers, radio stations, music promoters, and much more. So, I thought I'd interview Gabriel via email and see what his plans are for this free and useful music industry list.

1) Why did you start the spreadsheet?

GN: I love music and the deeper I got into Twitter the more I realized there were many other passionate music fans.  People would post tweets saying so and so bands were on Twitter and so I thought I should quickly whip something up that helps keep track of bands using Twitter. This was at the end of January 2009 and within the last couple of months, there has been explosive growth on Twitter which has translated into a lot of new bands using Twitter.

2) What has surprised you about the spreadsheet?

GN:  Maybe it was naive of me but I never expected that people would embrace it and find it extremely valuable. I did Tweet about it a few times and not having that many followers at the time, I didn't think I had that much reach. Really it was only meant for a handful of my closet followers to use.

But if you have something that people believe is valuable and you are willing to open up and share, Twitter is an amazing communication and relationship building platform. So when various high profile blogs (Pitchfork, Stereogum, Guardian music UK) and high profile Twitterers (Mashable) picked up on it, the list took off, and it was obvious at that point that I was onto something.

3) You should turn the spreadsheet into a free web based directory where people can search, view, add, edit, etc. - thoughts?

GN: Absolutely! It's painfully obvious a spreadsheet will just not cut it! I'm working with a small team and are turning the spreadsheet into a web based directory. We have a few great ideas that once developed will make using the Artists on Twitter directory very easy to use and interactive. The plan is to keep it a crowdsourced/wiki-style directory. I have found that quite a few people have become protective of the directory.  I get many emails telling me about fake/questionable accounts or just general information that helps ensure that the list stays clean, timely and accurate.

4) What's the official name of the spreadsheet?

GN: Well, I started off calling it the Artists on Twitter list and that is what so many people know it by. So we will most probably keep referring to it that way.

5) Can you track how many times it's been viewed, if so, what are the numbers?

GN:  Yes, we have had close to 8,000 visits.

6) I see you've added several new tabs to capture other music properties, like music blogs, labels, music services and more. Those are all great additions, why did you decide to do that? What other sections are you going to add? I'd like to see venues added to the list.

GN: Well, we first started with the most obvious, artists and as people started submitting new entries, I started creating new sections like music bloggers, music labels. I've had people contacting me asking if we could add new sections and we are always open to new ideas and suggestions.  For example, I just got an email yesterday (Friday, April 3rd) from a guitar amp maker (@gabstero) and he asked if I could add a section for musical instrument manufacturers.   I also was recently asked to add a section for sheet music/guitar tabs. Both ideas I thought were brilliant. I know there are a lot of Twitter people who play instruments.

For the average music fan, the artists section will be more important than say the music promoters section.  But if you are a band and you are seeking specific band services (for example a band manager), you would focus on the music services section. A really good example is when an indie band out of Chicago posted a tweet saying they were looking for a new band manager. After seeing the tweet, I was able to help them get in touch with a couple of contacts that added themselves to the Artists on Twitter list.

7) It seems to have it's own life from an organic community effort. How are you trying to grow input?

GN: People just love music! From the casual to the most passionate music fan, music elicits a certain passion and response. You can't go anywhere without hearing music and just like food, music brings people together and is a great way to celebrate life! In the online world, Twitter is perfectly suited to bring together a lot of people from around the world together to discuss just about any topic or subject. We are seeing that with Stocktwits.com, which has become its own Twitter powered community for people interested in stocks, finance, business and economics.

So for us, we engage other music fans by sharing informative links and new music, and by having a vibrant discussion about anything related music. Anyone interested in music will naturally gravitate to the discussion and to the Artists on Twitter list. The key point is that we are an open community, and we take a bottom-up approach to building the list.

GN: I am continually amazed at how deep the list is. Whenever I come across a band and check the list to see if they are on it, I see that someone has already added it. So I would say we have pretty much all the big names covered because these were the first entries that people contributed. Now, I'm starting to see a lot of indie/emerging artists being added.

9) What are the present numbers (e.g. total number of bands, labels, etc.)?

GN: As of April 4th, we have 1557.  Arists make up 1200 of them. Record labels, music bloggers, music services, etc. make up the rest.

Good stuff Gabriel! I look forward to watching the list grow.