Koinup

Koinup was an image and video hosting service, web portal and online community for virtual world users. It was used both as a photo and video repository platform and as a tool to share virtual world screenshots, photographs and machinima. As of November 2008, it claimed to host more than 100,000 items uploaded by its members and reaches about 100,000 visitors monthly.

Koinup
Type of site
Image and video hosting service
Available inEnglish
OwnerKoinup Srl (subsidiary of ExitReality)
URLKoinup.com
CommercialYes
RegistrationOptional (required for uploading files)
Launched2007 (2007)
Current statusInactive

Centered on the concept of “Share your Virtual Life", Koinup offered a social networking platform for all virtual world inhabitants.[1][2]

History

Koinup was developed by Koinup Srl, a Brescia, Italy-based company founded in March 2007. The service was launched in September 2007, preceded by a four-month beta period.[3] Initially, the two founders Pierluigi Casolari and Edoardo Turelli served respectively as chief executive officer and chief technical officer. Along with competitors such as gamerDNA, Koinup followed a trend in the social network scenery at that time by building a social network for online games.[4][5]

According to the blog of the former company, on January 8th, 2013, Koinup was acquired by ExitReality.[6]

Features

Koinup was a free service, allowing members to upload up to 1.5 gigabytes of photo and video content. As of 2008, Koinup did not offer a paid premium plan. Uploaders could add tags to their entries and create photo or video galleries. Uploaded content could be shared either by embedding web widgets on websites, or by using a set of social media sharing tools.[7]

Koinup also featured tools aimed at creating a bridge between virtual worlds and the website. These tools allowed users to interact with their Koinup account while they are in virtual worlds. Particularly, members could send postcards directly from the clients to their Koinup galleries without leaving the virtual worlds.

One of the most popular features on the website was the Koinup Places Section. Koinup Places allowed users to geotag virtual world locations and upload them on Koinup. This feature created a user-generated directory of the best places hosted in virtual worlds. According to a publication in 2008, more than 1,000 virtual places have already been suggested by the Koinup community.[8]

On April 22, 2010, Koinup expanded their service by launching a paid application on the Nokia Store featuring wallpapers of virtual world related image content. With the launch of Metaverse Wallpapers on March 11, 2011 on Apple's App Store, a similar application became available for iOS devices.

Interoperability

One of the main challenges faced by Koinup was the issue of interoperability between virtual worlds.[9]

In 2007, the virtual world scene was made up of numerous standalone walled gardens that did not communicate with each other. Even as of this writing in 2023, the virtual world scene is made up of numerous standalone walled gardens that only minimally communicate with each other. Only since 2022 were there standardized tools for moving and sharing the avatar identity from one world to another or ways to interact with multiple virtual worlds from a single dashboard. In response to this problem, one of Koinup's goals was to allow users to manage both the content and the friends they have in various virtual worlds with a single account.

References
  1. Seiler, Joey (September 19, 2007). "Virtual Worlds News: KoinUp, Bringing One Social Network To All Your Virtual Worlds". Virtual Worlds News. Archived from the original on 16 December 2008. Retrieved 10 July 2013.
  2. Ostrow, Adam (September 18, 2007). "Koinup Launches Social Network for Your Virtual Life". Mashable. Retrieved 10 July 2013.
  3. "Press Area – Koinup". Retrieved 12 December 2013.
  4. Forrest, Brady (December 4, 2006). "WoW and Cottage Industries". O'Reilly Radar. Retrieved 11 July 2013.
  5. Sterling, Bruce (September 28, 2007). "Get a First Life". Wired. Retrieved 11 July 2013.
  6. Stefanic, Danny (January 8, 2013). "A word from the new chairman". Blogger. Retrieved 27 May 2023.Stefanic, Danny (January 8, 2013). "A word from the new chairman". Blogger. Retrieved 27 May 2023.
  7. Pierluigi, Casolari (June 18, 2008). "Send to Friends, Koinup Items!". Koinup Blog. Retrieved 11 July 2013.
  8. Wagner James, Au (September 25, 2008). "1000 Great Second Life Places In Koinup's Places Directory". New World Notes. Retrieved 11 July 2013.
  9. Terdiman Cnet News, Daniel (September 26, 2007). "Koinup, a new (virtual) social network". CNET News. Retrieved 11 July 2013.
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