plug.dj

plug.dj is an interactive online social music streaming website based in Los Angeles, owned by Rowl, Inc.[1] The site is "dedicated to growing positive international communities for sharing and discovering music". It allows ages 13+, is a free service with microtransactions, and already has over 3 million registered accounts. The website was launched on February 29, 2012 by Steven Sacks, Alex Reinlieb, and Jason Grunstra. The company used investments from Javelin Venture Partners in December 2013 to improve their team and community support, as well as launch new services.[2]

plug.dj
Type of businessPrivate
Available inMultilingual, primarily English
FoundedFebruary 2012 (2012-02)
Founder(s)Steven Sacks
Alex Reinlieb
Jason Grunstra
URLplug.dj
RegistrationEmail or Facebook account
Current statusActive
Written inGo (backend)

Overview

Plug.dj consists of different online chat rooms, called "communities", that users can freely create.[3][4][5] Inside each community, users can choose to join a wait list and wait for their turn to be the DJ for everyone else in the community, playing a video or song chosen from either YouTube or SoundCloud, or simply listen passively.[6] Users can also vote positively or negatively for each song or video played, or add it to their own playlists.[7] By spending time or being active on the site, they earn experience points (XP) and plug points (PP), which are used to unlock and purchase various items, such as new avatars and chat badges. Each community on plug.dj is typically focused on a few specific musical genres, usually one of the subgenres of EDM (Electronic Dance Music), such as Trap, Dubstep, Electro, Drum'n'Bass and many others.[8] Communities dedicated to non-electronic genres, such as rock, jazz, death metal, and classical also exist.[9] The community creator is able to promote users to moderators to help ensure the community's rules are followed and to keep the environment friendly.[10] Volunteer global moderators, called "Brand Ambassadors", also exist.[11][12]

In April 2015, a paid subscription service was launched, which provides access to subscriber avatars and badges without the user having to spend PP.

Financial issues

On September 14, 2015, plug.dj announced that the service would be shutting down if it was unable to raise enough money to support the running of the service by a disclosed deadline of September 28 through a donation drive.[13] It was noted by the administrators of plug.dj that the company was forced to sell their office and developers were to work from home in order to reduce running costs. Other attempts to reduce costs, like another tier in plug.dj subscription system, rewriting some portions of the backend in Go (plug.dj was previously written in Python, a less-efficient and consequently more expensive programming language to operate under) and cutting staff were unsuccessful in keeping the service afloat.[14] On September 28, 2015, having not met their donation goal in time, the plug.dj service went offline at 3 PM Pacific Standard Time and the closure of its parent company, Plug DJ Inc. followed at an unknown date.[15][16][17][18]

Relaunch

On December 10, 2015, plug.dj posted a message on their Facebook page, saying "The hype is real".[19] Later, on February 8, 2016, another post was made explaining that the service will likely return under new management at an unannounced date.[20] The site was bought by Rowl, Inc[1] and relaunched on May 31, 2016 with the existing user database restored. This brought all playlists back allowing users to keep all data that they had previously.

See also

References
  1. "Official Update: plug.dj is now owned by Rowl". plug.dj. 25 July 2016. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  2. Galera, Alex (15 October 2015). "dubtrack, un clon del fallecido Turntable, para crear salas de música en Internet". wwwhatsnew.com. wwwhatsnew.com. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  3. Grunsta, Jason. "PLUG.DJ DROPS THE RIGHT TUNE WITH IN-APP MESSAGES". Intercom. © Intercom 2016. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  4. Steinburg, Scott (28 March 2012). "Sounddrop.fm Unveils Social Jukebox App Program requires Spotify Premium account". Rolling Stones Magazine. © 2016 Rolling Stone. Rolling Stones. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  5. Lasar, Matthew. "Classical communities at plug.dj: if you can't make one, join one". Radio Survivor. Radio Survivor. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  6. Davis, Zach (7 December 2012). "LA's Hottest Showcasing Startup, Plug.dj Hopes to Give Turntable.fm A Run For Their Money". Tech.co. Tech Cocktail. Tech.co. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  7. Riotta, Chris. "In Case You Didn't Know, There Actually Are Alternatives to Spotify and Apple Music". Music.Mic. Music.Mic. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  8. Roa, Ericka Duarte (13 February 2013). "PLUG.DJ, UNA FIESTA EN LA QUE TODOS PUEDEN SER DJ". enter.co (in Spanish). COPYRIGHT © 2016 ENTER.CO S.A.S. enter.co. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  9. Machida, Roberts (7 December 2013). "アニソン、ダブステップ何でもOK！ かわいいアバターでDJパーティを楽しむ『plug.dj』". Kotaku (in Japanese). © mediagene Inc. Kotaku. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  10. Lasar, Matthew (17 March 2014). "The secret to great online music room communities: real off line connections". Radio Survivor. Radio Survivor. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  11. Rodriguez, Sarah (6 August 2012). "Plug.dj Develops Ibiza Themed Party to Support BBC Radio 1's Ibiza Weekend". pr.com. pr.com. pr.com. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  12. Nguyen, Stephanie (28 July 2012). "Go DJ, That's My DJ: Plug.DJ Empowers Global Media Lovers". Tech.co. Tech.co. Tech Cocktail. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  13. Wolf, Jacob (28 September 2015). "The heir to Turntable.fm is shutting its doors". The Daily Dot. The Daily Dot, LLC. The Daily Dot. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  14. "I'm the Founder of plug.dj. AMA". reddit.com. 2015.
  15. Olanoff, Drew (26 September 2015). "UPDATED: Turntable.fm Clone Plug.dj Has Shut Down". TechCrunch. © 2013-2016 AOL Inc. All rights reserved. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  16. Lasar, Matthe (30 September 2015). "The perils of a young audience: why plug.dj died". Radio Survivor. © 2016 Radio Survivor. All Rights Reserved. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  17. Reid, Mike (30 September 2015). "Plug.dj, a Turntable.fm clone, shuts down". Tiny mix tapes. © 2016 Tiny Mix Tapes. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  18. Volceka, Petr (5 October 2015). "Plug.dj končí, s přáteli si už po večerech nezamuzicírujete". PCDays Magazine (in Czech). PCDays Magazine. PCDays. Retrieved 26 March 2016.
  19. "plug.dj - The hype is real. | Facebook". www.facebook.com. Retrieved 2015-12-10.
  20. "We're all anxiously awaiting the relaunch, and once we have a real date, we will let you know! | Facebook". www.facebook.com. Retrieved 2016-02-08.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.