Social DJ site Turntable.fm launched ten years ago, letting people take turns to add songs to a shared playlist in a room with their friends. Sadly, it shut down in 2013 over high operating costs and a shrinking audience. Now, though, not only is the website itself back up and running, there’s also another effort to bring it back in a new form.
Founder Billy Chasen responded to a tweet confirming his involvement with the revived website, which currently doesn’t appear to be available to the public. Some people are reporting issues like tracks missing even while searching with a video ID, but the majority of questions are folks asking for access. Details on when this might open to the public are also sparse.
One of the original founding team members Joseph Perla announced in February that he was bringing the service back as Turntable.org with a target April beta launch date. Perla’s version will be mobile-first and appears to involve a subscription payment model. Perla is also working with Simon Oxley, founding designer of Turntable.fm’s avatars.
The original site was loved by many and it’s a welcome surprise to see it back. The world, especially the music industry, have changed a lot since 2013, and it remains to be seen what, if any, lessons Turntable.fm and Turntable.org take from the first go-around, and from the other replacements that have popped up since its demise. Turntable.fm’s About page still boasts that it’s music selected by people, not algorithms, which may be just the new/old thing I needed today.
