2 Degrees, explained.
The simple idea behind LiveGrid’s discovery and matching: the music industry already works by warm intros — we just make those intros visible.
The idea in one sentence
LiveGrid surfaces people, jobs, and shows that are at most two introductions away from you — never random strangers, never cold lists.
The graph
Every account on LiveGrid is a node in a connection graph. Edges form when:
- You follow someone or accept their follow.
- You connect Spotify and share a listening overlap above a threshold.
- You and another user have shared LinkedIn connections (with permission).
- You both check in at the same venue within the same hour.
- You have completed a booking together.
From your node, “1 degree” means a direct connection. “2 degrees” means a friend of a friend. The algorithm rarely surfaces beyond 2 because signal quality drops off a cliff at 3+.
A diagram
Drew and Lena are people you already know. Josh, Sam, Kai, and Rio are who LiveGrid surfaces. Anything past that is filtered unless an explicit query asks for it.
What 2 Degrees powers
Job matching for artists
A venue posting gets ranked higher in your feed if the venue owner is 2 degrees from you — former bandmate's old venue, roommate's sister's spot, etc.
Applicant ranking for venues
When artists apply to your job, the ones with shared connections to you or to artists you've booked before float to the top.
Discovery for patrons
Shows where any of your 1- or 2-degree connections are checked in get highlighted in your feed.
Friend suggestions
"You may know" reflects 2-degree overlaps weighted by how many shared edges exist between you.
Privacy: what we never expose
- Precise GPS location: Other users only ever see approximate distance ("~3 mi") or venue presence ("at The Echo tonight").
- Your contact list: If you opt into contact-matching, contacts are hashed on-device and only the hashes are sent to our servers.
- Listening history details: The algorithm uses an aggregated taste profile, not your individual play history.
- Private connections: If a mutual contact has set their profile to private, we count their edge but never reveal their identity to either side.
Privacy: what you control
- Visibility: Public, friends-of-friends only, or private. Set in
Account › Privacy & data. - Connected accounts: Disconnect Spotify, Apple, LinkedIn at any time. Disconnecting drops the edges they contributed.
- Check-in opt-out: You can opt out of your check-in count being visible to anyone, including friends.
- Approximate distance only: Precise location is off by default and never shared, even when on.
What 2 Degrees is not
- It is not a content recommender system. We never auto-generate a playlist or decide which music you should like.
- It is not a credit score. Edges exist or do not; we do not rank people on a 1–100 scale and never publish such a score.
- It is not a tracker. The graph is built from edges you explicitly contributed (followed, connected, booked, checked in).