Ask HN: Idea Feedback - Mobile Sportsbar/Pub Trivia

Given ideas are a dime a dozen, here's one I had the other day. At Buffalo Wild Wings and some other venues I've seen BuzzTime Trivia, it's a location based trivia game that people can play at the venue using controllers on the table while monitoring results on TVs around the restaurant.

BuzzTime seems married to their hardware business, and from the little pricing information I've found, it's pretty expensive for an owner/proprietor to get it installed (@ $10-15K setup + monthly subscription fees for content packages at over $300/mo.). I would venture this price point is too expensive for many venues who are interested but scared to commit to the initial investment to see if it helps business.

Given the mass proliferation of smart phones with network connections, what about a more affordable version that uses phone instead of the table top terminals?

The idea would be:

- Players check into the venue (something similar to 4square to reasonably ensure the player is at the actual location) to play. Ideally you do the entire game in the browser without requiring a native app to start.

- Compete for prizes, prestige at the venue by playing against others. Start with just once devoted niche like Monday Night Football fans to start before branching out. Perhaps the trivia is curtailed to the venue's location and oppposing teams: e.g. Green Bay, WI trivia along with Packers and Broncos questions.

- Provide a dashboard app for owners to hook up and show game activity in the venue. Make it skinnable and allow them to integrate their current promotions, specials, etc.

- Integrate with the usual social media channels to increase visibility for the venue through players that participate

- Price it as an affordable SaaS type offering with just a monthly service fee that can be cancelled at any time.

I'm thinking of contacting some restaurant managers but before doing so, I thought I'd post it out to HN to see if others have some feedback. Any feedback is welcome. Perhaps there are ways to make it more fun, etc. Perhaps it won’t be any fun at all! This definitely feels like a vitamin and not a pain killler, as they say, but Buzztime shows there is a market at least. I’m not trying to build the next Google, only instead find a profitable niche for a small company that allows me to work independently.

I have no idea how feasible it is from a technology perspective yet, but I'm hoping a real time, multi-user trivia app on current mobile browsers is possible.

Thanks!