Global Value-Add & Partnership Scale Matrix

A news site in easy Swedish since 1984, with short sentences, short summary lines and a 'Listen' link on every article that reads it aloud.

Give every TODAY page an 'Easy words' version and a 'Listen' button, so venue offers, show terms and rules can be read in short sentences or heard.

A reader who struggles with long text can still understand a venue's offer and hear it read aloud. — Test: Write easy-words and audio versions of the 10 most-read Hub pages.

A charity offering free IT help to older and disabled people: a weekday phone line, a nearby checked volunteer who visits the home, and remote help on the person's device only if they agree.

Run a 'call a person' help line for TODAY with phone and WhatsApp, and let a trained helper see the user's screen only after the user says yes out loud and taps yes.

An older user stuck on a screen gets a real person who can see the problem, with their permission. — Test: Staff a two-hour daily help line for one month for Hub users over 60.

The city lends residents, free, a box for the home phone that plays a warning that the call will be recorded before it rings, which puts off scam callers.

Before any unknown person can message or call an older TODAY user, play a short notice that the conversation is recorded and checked, and let the user turn on 'only people I know can reach me'.

Scammers give up before they reach the older person at all. — Test: Turn on the warning notice for first-time contacts of users over 65 for one month.

A person can give, or a helper can ask for, a power of attorney to use public self-service for them. The giver approves with their digital ID or signs a paper letter, and can remove it later under 'My powers of attorney'.

Let a family helper send an 'Ask to help' request in TODAY that the older person approves with one tap, or by signing a printed letter that our help desk scans in, so people without smartphones are not left out.

An older artist with no smartphone can still give his son the right to manage bookings. — Test: Offer the paper approval route to 10 older users who have no smartphone.

People who cannot manage digital post (for example because of dementia, no device, or language) can be exempted and get paper letters instead, and public bodies must offer a non-digital route to every service.

Promise that every key TODAY step (accepting a venue offer, getting paid, ending a helper's rights) can also be done by phone with a person or by post, and let a user choose 'send me paper' for important notices.

An older artist who will never use an app is not shut out of the Hub. — Test: Offer a phone-and-paper route for accepting offers to 10 older artists.

A leaflet for relatives who help others online: never use the other person's digital ID, look away when they type their codes, use a power of attorney or read access instead, and remember public bodies must offer a non-digital way.

Show every new TODAY helper a one-screen 'helper's promise' (never ask for their password, look away when they type it, use your own helper login) that they must agree to before their helper rights start.

Families help safely, and older users know what a real helper will never ask for. — Test: Add the helper's promise to the helper set-up flow for one month.

A postal worker visits an older person once a month, asks 10 set questions on a tablet and sends the family a report with photos. A separate daily automated call checks in and emails family if two calls in a row go unanswered.

Add a free daily 'I'm OK' check-in for older users of TODAY: one tap or one answered call a day, and named family get a message only if it is missed twice.

A daughter abroad knows her father is fine each day without phoning him every morning. — Test: Offer the daily check-in to 20 older users and their families for one month.

People forward a scam text to 7726 for free, and their phone company looks into the sender and can block it. The page reports 41.9K scams removed through 7726.

Give every message in the TODAY inbox a 'This looks like a scam' button that hides it, warns others who got the same message, and in the UK shows how to forward it to 7726.

One person's report protects every other older user who got the same fake message. — Test: Add the report button to the Hub inbox and track reports for one month.

KOMP is a one-knob screen for an older person: no touchscreen, menu or password. Family send photos and messages and start video calls from a phone app, and calls connect on their own after about 10 seconds.

Offer a 'family screen' mode of TODAY that runs on a cheap tablet left on a shelf: Dad's shows, family photos and messages appear on their own, and invited family control it from their own phones.

A 73-year-old sees his family and his next show date without touching a single setting. — Test: Set up one old tablet in family-screen mode for one older user and let two relatives post to it for two weeks.

Safaricom says it only calls from one number (0722000000), tells customers to report scam numbers to 333, and warns never to dial codes a stranger gives. Its fake-message page shows the tell-tale sign of a fake M-PESA text, a balance that reads 'LOCKED', and says to forward it to 333.

Publish one short 'How TODAY will contact you' card (the only numbers and senders we use) in every language, and teach users the two or three signs of a fake TODAY message, with one-tap forwarding to our scam team.

An older user knows that a call from any other number is not TODAY and hangs up. — Test: Send the contact card to 500 users and later send a harmless test 'fake' to see who reports it.

Anyone who gets an unexpected call about money can hang up and dial 159, a short number that cannot be faked, and be put through to their own bank. Phone companies carry the calls and more than 20 banks take part.

Put one big 'Check with my bank' button on every TODAY money screen that, in the UK, dials 159, and in other countries dials the bank's own published number, never a number from a message or caller.

An older person who gets a worrying call reaches their real bank in one tap instead of the scammer's fake line. — Test: Add the 159 button to the UK WealthEnergy help page and count how many people tap it in a month.

A person picks someone they trust, chooses which matters that person may handle, and sets how long the permission lasts. The helper can then act for them in any public online service that accepts these permissions.

Build 'Let someone help me' in TODAY: the owner picks a helper, ticks which pieces they may use (for example 'answer venue offers' but not 'move money'), and sets an end date, with a plain list showing every permission given.

A son can answer venue offers for his father's shows without ever using his father's password. — Test: Let five artists name one helper with 'answer offers only' rights on the Hub and watch how they use it for a month.

A relative asks for 'read and write access' to an older person's Digital Post from their own login; once the older person accepts, the relative can read and reply to public-sector letters without ever using the older person's ID.

Let an older TODAY user give a family member 'read my messages' access to their TODAY inbox, so the helper can read and reply to venues while every reply is marked as sent by the helper.

A son can keep up with his father's venue messages and the venue can see who is replying. — Test: Let 10 artists add one inbox helper for a month.

Developers build menus that run when someone dials a short code like *483#, on any phone with no internet, in 11 African markets. The code owner can pay so the user's session is free.

Give TODAY a dial-a-code menu so a venue or artist on a basic phone can see new offers and accept or decline by pressing numbers, with TODAY paying the session cost.

A venue owner in rural Kenya with a basic phone can still take part in the Hub. — Test: Build a three-option USSD menu (see offers, accept, call me) on a shared code in Kenya.

An open-source translation model covering all 22 scheduled Indian languages plus English, with model files under the MIT licence.

Use the open model to translate Hub offers and help pages into Indian languages on our own servers, with a 'this was machine translated, tap to ask a person' note.

A Tamil-speaking venue owner reads an artist's offer in Tamil the moment it arrives. — Test: Translate the 20 most common Hub messages into Hindi and Tamil and have native speakers rate them.

The bank runs Digital Wings online courses and in-person 'Tea and Teach', DigiSafe and Digital Bar sessions to build confidence with computers, the internet and online safety.

Ask Hub venues to host a free 'Tea and Teach' hour before afternoon shows, where volunteers show older fans how to find shows and stay safe in TODAY.

Older fans learn the app over tea at a place they already visit, and the venue gets an early crowd. — Test: Run one Tea and Teach at one partner venue before a matinee show.

A button on the back of Doro phones that, when held, texts up to five chosen contacts with the last known location and then calls them one by one until someone answers, on loudspeaker.

Add a 'Get help' button to TODAY's simple mode that sends a message and location to the person's chosen family members and calls them in order until one picks up.

An older person who falls ill at a gig reaches family with one press. — Test: Test the button with 10 older users and their families in a practice drill.

A universal-design Japanese typeface made easy to read for a wide range of people, with large letter faces and simplified strokes on some characters, offered through Google Fonts.

Use universal-design typefaces like this for every language TODAY supports, with a one-tap 'bigger letters' setting that never breaks the page.

A reader with weak eyesight can read venue offers without glasses in Japanese and other scripts. — Test: Switch the Japanese Hub pages to BIZ UDGothic and test with 10 readers over 65.

An account holder adds up to 5 trusted people who can pay from the holder's account in their own payment app, either asking approval for each payment or paying freely within limits the holder sets (up to ₹5,000 a payment and ₹15,000 a month).

Through a licensed payment partner, let an older user give a family helper a small, limited allowance to pay Hub or shop costs, with the older user seeing every payment and able to switch to 'ask me first'.

A daughter can pay her father's venue deposit with his money, within his limit, without his PIN. — Test: Ask one Indian licensed payment partner whether UPI Circle requests can start from a TODAY payment link, and test with one family.

Attorneys and the person who made a lasting power of attorney can let a bank or other organisation see a one-page summary of it online, and can see who has been given access.

Let a TODAY user upload proof that someone may act for them, and share only a one-page summary with a venue or licensed partner, with a list of who has seen it.

A family member can prove they may act for an older artist without posting the whole legal paper to everyone. — Test: Let 5 families attach a helper permission summary and share it with one partner.

Organisations send documents to be checked for clearness; approved documents carry the Crystal Mark with its own ID number. Over 2,000 organisations use it on more than 24,000 documents.

Get TODAY's key pages (the venue-offer agreement, ambassador program terms, money warnings) checked and marked for plain English, and show the mark so users trust they can understand them.

An older artist can sign a venue agreement knowing it was written to be understood. — Test: Submit the one-page Hub offer agreement for a Crystal Mark.

A set of self-service tips using short phone codes that work on any phone: unlock a SIM, check fees, get a mini-statement, report an agent and update next-of-kin details, plus short rules like 'PIN yako ni SIRI yako' (your PIN is your secret).

Give older users a printed 'TODAY in five codes' card, each code or tap doing one common job (see my offers, call a person, add my next of kin), with one memorable safety rule in their own language.

An older user does the five things he needs without opening a menu. — Test: Hand out the five-code card at one Tea and Teach session and one senior club.

A members' association with more than 200 local clubs where volunteer instructors teach older people to use PCs, tablets and phones, plus phone help, short how-to videos and printed guide booklets.

Partner with senior clubs so their volunteers run a one-hour 'TODAY for beginners' session, using our printed one-page guides in the member's own language.

Older people learn the app from a neighbour in their own club, not from a screen. — Test: Run one session with one senior club and hand out a one-page guide.

An electric hot-water pot with a wireless chip emails family each time it is used, and shows a one-week usage graph, so family know an older parent is going about their day.

Use signs the older person already gives inside TODAY, like opening the app or playing Dad's song of the day, as a quiet 'all is well' signal to family who opt in, with no extra device.

Family get peace of mind without the older person having to remember to check in. — Test: Offer 10 families an opt-in weekly 'active days' summary for their older relative.

India's national helpline for older people gives information on pensions and care, guidance on legal, money and tech problems, emotional support by phone, and field help such as rescuing homeless older people, through partner groups.

Link TODAY's help desk to each country's public senior helpline, so a caller with a problem we cannot solve (pension, abuse, housing) is passed on warmly with their permission.

An older user calling about the app but in real trouble gets to the right public service. — Test: Write a one-page referral list of senior helplines for India, the UK, Japan, Kenya and the Nordics and train help-desk staff on it.

A free speech-to-speech translation app from Japan's national research institute that translates between 33 languages and lets the speaker check the translation. Commercial use of the technology needs a separate deal with NICT.

Partner with a speech-translation provider so a venue and a visiting artist can talk through TODAY, each in their own language, with the text shown so both can check it.

A Japanese venue owner and a Jamaican artist can agree a show without a shared language. — Test: Ask NICT about licence terms and test one Japanese-English call between a venue and an artist.

A national relay service: deaf or speech-impaired people use an app or textphone to make and receive calls, and can reach 999 through a relay assistant or emergencySMS.

Make every TODAY phone help line reachable by text relay and by typed chat, so a user who cannot hear well gets the same human help.

A user with hearing loss can still call the help line about a booking. — Test: Test our help line with one Relay UK call and one chat-only session.

Blind and low-vision users can seek visual assistance from volunteers, businesses and AI-enabled tools.

Make every important task offer accessible instructions and a request for human help, preserving the customer's current event, item or application context.

Complete difficult steps with assistance instead of abandoning the task. — Test: Test event signup and equipment checkout with accessibility participants and a clearly bounded human-help flow.

An open-source support platform combines website, email and messaging conversations with contact context and a help center.

Create a shared human help desk across the three sites using one case reference and permissioned task context. Route conversations to the right person, preserve the customer's story and review replies before sending.

Get consistent human help without explaining the same problem repeatedly. — Test: Replay five synthetic cross-site cases through a shared inbox with separate marketplace and event support roles.

Business messaging APIs support templates, interactive messages and updates such as appointment or order confirmations.

Send consented case updates with one clear action and a link back to saved progress. Let customers reach a human using the same case reference, while consequential decisions remain explicit and reviewable.

Keep track of progress in a familiar channel without losing the original request. — Test: Draft three opt-in status messages with synthetic case links and review them on an older user's phone.

US artists upload up to two tracks every 30 days, and each upload goes first to the local Introducing show for the artist's area, which listens to as much as it can; currently only Tennessee is accepted.

Route every TODAY A&R upload to a named local listener (a station, venue booker or scene curator in the artist's own town) first, with a clear limit on how often to submit and an honest wait time.

A new artist knows a real local person in their own town will hear the track, and roughly when. — Test: Sign up 3 local curators in one city and send them every A&R upload from that city for one month.

China's large ticket app lets a friend or relative buy a ticket for you and then, with permission, lets you look up that order yourself without switching accounts; it also offers ticket-grab reservations and one-tap ordering for busy on-sales.

Let a TODAY user buy a '+1' ticket for a friend and hand it over by link, so the friend sees the ticket, the time and the door details in their own account without signing in as the buyer.

An older fan's grandchild buys both tickets, and the fan still has their own ticket on their own phone. — Test: Add 'send this ticket to a friend' to 3 shows and count how many second tickets are passed on.

A free platform where indie artists post songs and news; Tower Records' buyers scout promising artists from it for CD releases, fans can fund an artist's appearance at live events, and regional shows and a teen festival with online rounds give scouted acts a stage.

Ask local record shops, radio hosts and venue bookers to act as TODAY A&R scouts in their own town, picking from local uploads for an in-store show or a support slot, with fans able to chip in to put a favourite on the bill. Any money involved moves only through a licensed payment partner.

A new artist is picked by a real local shop or venue and gets a first stage, with fans helping. — Test: Sign up 2 record shops in one city as scouts and have each pick 2 local uploads for an in-store show.

A charity that takes interactive concerts into care homes and runs 8-12 session residencies where early-career musicians, trained and mentored by the charity, make music with residents and care staff.

List care homes, day centres and senior clubs as small venues on TODAY, so they can book trained musicians for sing-along visits, with older artists like SkyHigh offered as performers who share their generation's songs.

Care-home residents hear live music in their own home, and musicians get steady daytime work. — Test: Offer 5 care homes a monthly musician visit booked through TODAY and track repeat bookings.

Home owners register their porch, patio or lawn by a deadline, can ask for particular musicians or let the committee match them, and the committee emails each host their band and time slot, mails balloons to mark the porch, and asks hosts to count the crowd.

Let a town or neighbourhood group run a 'porch day' on TODAY: hosts sign up porches, artists sign up for hour slots, the app matches them and makes the walking map, and each host taps in the crowd count.

A neighbourhood turns its streets into a free festival in one afternoon, and local artists play for real crowds. — Test: Run host-and-artist matching for one town's porch day using a simple sign-up form and a printed map.

Hosts sign up free, offer any room, and book artists with a binding contract under one of three deals: a fixed fee held in trust-hold, a 'hat with a guarantee' where the host covers any shortfall, or 'hat only' when the artist asked to play; a 2% booking fee covers the trust-hold.

Offer the same three plain deals for house concerts on TODAY, explained in one line each, with the guarantee held by a licensed payment partner and released after the show.

A host knows exactly what they owe, and the artist knows the least they will take home. — Test: Set up 5 house concerts using the 'hat with a guarantee' deal and record what each artist took home.

For the yearly fan awards, about 6,000 listeners named the artist who stayed with them most, giving 70 nominees across three career-stage categories; registered fans can then vote once per artist per day.

Run a yearly 'local favourites' vote on TODAY A&R in which nominees come from fans' own answers, groups are split by how long an artist has been active, and each account can vote once a day.

Newer artists are not drowned out by established ones, and fans' choices decide the shortlist. — Test: Run a one-city fan vote with two career-stage groups for 2 weeks.

Volunteers and adults with learning disabilities both sign up, volunteers are trained and checked, and pairs are matched by age, area, support needs and, above all, music taste, to go to gigs together; projects run across the UK and in Germany, New Zealand, Australia and Ireland.

Add a 'go with a buddy' option to TODAY events: people who would not go alone are matched with a checked volunteer who likes the same music, and the pair is shown together at the door.

Someone who never goes out alone gets to see live music with a friend who shares their taste. — Test: Ask Stay Up Late whether a local Gig Buddies project would list its pairs' upcoming gigs on TODAY.

A nonprofit that has run about 800 acoustic house concerts a year since 2007; hosts agree to seat at least 30 people, host six shows a season and give touring artists a bed and meals, and Home Routes helps organise and market each show.

Let hosts on TODAY join a 'season' instead of a single show: six dates a year, artists routed between nearby homes, and a bed-and-meal box the host ticks so artists save on hotels.

A touring artist strings together six paid nights in small towns, sleeping in hosts' homes instead of hotels. — Test: Sign up 6 hosts within a two-hour drive and route one artist through all six on one trip.

On 21 June, free music happens in public places in many cities. Hosts (shops, parks, porches) and musicians list themselves on their city's site, then search each other's listings and arrange their own slots, using matchmaking software and a map the Alliance supplies.

Do the matching people now do by hand: for a TODAY 'play your street' day, hosts and artists sign up in the app, get suggested matches by place, style and time, confirm a slot in one tap, and every show appears on one map.

A shop owner hosts live music on the year's biggest free-music day, and a new artist plays to passers-by. — Test: Offer the local Make Music Day organiser in one city to list its matched shows on TODAY's map.

The Access Card turns a person's disability into simple symbols so venues know what help they need without seeing medical details; the full card costs £15 for three years and can bring free companion (personal assistant) tickets at venues across the UK, and links to the ticketing account so access needs carry over to each booking.

Let fans store their access needs once on TODAY (as symbols, not medical details) so every show they book offers the right seat and a free companion ticket where the venue gives one.

A fan who needs a carer books two seats in one go, without proving their disability every time. — Test: Ask Nimbus whether TODAY can read a fan's Access Card symbols (with consent) for 3 partner venues.

Members answer a few personality questions and are matched into groups of four to six strangers for a weekly Wednesday dinner at a partner restaurant revealed before the night; it runs in 200+ cities in 52 countries.

Offer a '+1 table' before intimate TODAY shows: people coming alone answer three questions and are seated with four or five others who like the same music, then walk to the show together.

A newcomer to a city goes to a show with a small group instead of alone. — Test: Offer a pre-show 'come alone, sit together' table at 3 intimate shows and count sign-ups.

For some popular shows, fans enter a free digital lottery for a small number of low-price seats, and winners are told by a set time and must buy within a short window.

When an intimate TODAY show has more interest than seats, offer a free lottery for some seats instead of first-come-first-served, with results at a set time and unbought seats passed to the next name.

A fan who cannot sit refreshing a page at noon still has a fair chance at a seat. — Test: Hold a 20-seat lottery for one oversubscribed small show and survey entrants afterwards.

A Tokyo sound-engineering school has put on a completely free show since 2011 (no drink charge either) for people curious about live music who have never been; 2,000 places were given out first come first served, and students ran the sound.

Run 'first show free' nights on TODAY for people who have never been to a small venue, with a sound school or college crew running the night, so new fans try live music at no risk.

Someone who has never been to a gig goes for free, and students get real show experience. — Test: Partner with one sound school or college to run one free 'first gig' night in a small venue.

The railway and property group sets up official street-performance spots around Shibuya Station where indie artists can play safely, and is taking over the Eggs artist platform and the GIGGS live-house listings to offer those artists street slots, auditions and ads on its trains and billboards.

Partner with a city, mall or transit operator to list approved busking spots as bookable 'venues' on TODAY, so street artists book a legal slot and fans can find them.

A street musician plays a safe, legal spot at a busy station, and passers-by can follow them. — Test: Ask one city or mall in Kingston or London to list 3 approved busking spots with time slots on TODAY.

Unsigned Australian artists upload music to the Unearthed site (over 170,000 tracks from 85,000+ artists by 2023), station staff pick tracks for airplay, and competitions put winning acts on major festival line-ups; Unearthed High does the same for school bands.

Tie TODAY A&R uploads to real stages: each quarter, the most-requested local uploads win an opening slot at a partner venue's show through the Hub.

A bedroom artist gets a real stage, not just a 'like'. — Test: Run one 'win an opening slot' round in one city with one partner venue.

A concert app where you pick your favourite artists and genres to get alerts for shows near you, see other users with similar taste who are going to a gig, make a group to plan shows with friends, and see in a chat who has already bought a ticket.

Show 'friends going' and 'people like you going' on every TODAY show card, with a one-tap group so friends can see who has bought and who is still deciding.

A fan sees that two friends are going and makes up their mind to go too. — Test: Add a 'who's going' list to 5 shows for users who opt in and compare ticket sales with 5 similar shows.

Spain gives 18-year-olds €400 for one year on a virtual or physical card, split into €200 for live arts and culture, €100 for physical goods and €100 for digital content.

When a city, school or sponsor gives young people show credit on TODAY, set aside a fixed share for live, local shows, so the credit fills small rooms and not only streaming. Any money involved moves only through a licensed payment partner.

Young people go to real local shows, and small venues fill seats. — Test: Give 50 young people a small show credit with half reserved for live events, and track where it is spent.