THIS Monday in New York, those so inclined could have toured Brooklyn's pizzerias, sweated to “outer-planetary” dub or attended a modern recasting of “Eurydice”. But which was worth your time? Deciding what to do in any big city can be difficult, making it tempting to stay in and catch up on e-mail instead. But that might in fact be the answer. Two companies—Flavorpill in America and le cool in Europe, acting separately—publish free, weekly e-mails that narrow the torrent down to the two dozen very best events.

There are plenty of places to look for reviews and recommendations, but they can be unreliable or prone to manipulation. And they do little to address the problem of volume: Time Out New York, a listings magazine, listed nearly 500 options for Monday alone. That is why Flavorpill and le cool have opted to provide “filtered cultural stimuli”, as Sascha Lewis, one of Flavorpill's founders, puts it. A stable of unpaid contributors selects events and writes recommendations. Part-time staff editors then assemble the listings. “It's about understanding quality within genres, not about specific genres,” says Lisa Hix, the editor of Flavorpill San Francisco. The result is an eclectic, catholic style that, its editors believe, does its best to distil excellence from cultural chaos.

Subscribers would appear to agree. Mr Lewis started Flavorpill informally in the wake of the failure, in 2000, of a dotcom start-up. It has since accumulated 560,000 subscribers across 11 weekly publications, including editions in six cities. New York, at 85,000, is the largest. For its part, le cool was founded in 2003 after René Lönngren, who was working in advertising at the time, encountered Flavorpill on a trip to New York. Based in Barcelona, it now reaches 110,000 readers in eight cities. For now, the two overlap only in London.

Flavorpill San Francisco recently recommended a play in which the audience works with a cast of “homeless and disabled individuals”, a collection of carnivorous plants and a musical that “channels the drama of suburban ennui and teen angst into lively song”. Any of these could be dismal. Yet the reviewers manage to find events that appeal to young, culturally influential urban dwellers.

Such people are highly attuned to the inauthenticity of culture manufactured in the pursuit of sales, so both Flavorpill and le cool say they are careful to separate advertising from editorial material, and to avoid promotional events. “Our readers can smell PR,” says Ms Hix. But Mr Lewis says that by selecting events that conform to the ineffable tastes of his audience, he has been able to aggregate this elusive group in a form that is attractive to advertisers. Advertisements from the likes of Budweiser, JetBlue and Nokia provide the bulk of Flavorpill's revenues.

The companies' operations are marked by a commendable looseness—nobody in le cool's head office, for example, can read the Istanbul edition, which is in Turkish. This means that advertisers must put an unaccustomed level of trust in the process, and have the stomach to place their brands in unpredictable contexts.

Flavorpill's London list recently described a performance “that re-enacts Prince William's conception with the help of two actors wearing cardboard boxes depicting Charles and Diana on their heads” and involved a live, on-stage sex act. Is this really an effective new way to sell beer? “We believe in what they're doing,” says Rudy Beltran, director of Budweiser Select, an American beer brand that is one of Flavorpill's biggest advertisers. Flavorpill, he says, lends his brand credibility among young professionals who guide the tastes of their peers.

With low overheads, limited marginal costs and eager advertisers, both companies have been able to expand without significant outside investment. Le cool's Spanish revenues could support the entire company, says Andrew Losowsky, le cool's editorial director, and advance advertising sales meant the London list was profitable months before it launched at the start of this year. Mr Lewis expects Flavorpill's revenues to be $4.2m in this, its fourth profitable year. Both companies plan editions in more cities soon.

It would seem a calculated risk, depending as it does on the continued enthusiasm of volunteers. There is also a danger that overexposure could damage the firms' underground credentials. But both are forging ahead: le cool has started publishing city guidebooks and produces an in-flight magazine for Vueling, a Spanish low-cost airline. Flavorpill now organises events and produces branded e-mails for corporate clients. They started out as mailing lists, but both firms are acquiring the flavour of media companies.