JD
JD stands for JuicyDuff and was once the benchmark of a successful social networking website, and celebrity fansite. The site started in 2004 after a deal with Hilary Duff’s management fell through whilst I was still in high school.
With the help of volunteers, I led the development of the website and saw it grow to over 20,000 members and 1,000,000 posts. The site was handpicked by MTV Networks and Google PLC to test new video advertisement technology as as one of the top entertainment websites on the internet. It consistently ranked among the world’s largest communities and scored in the top 1,000 boards online (Big Boards). It was also voted as the best forum of the month in May 2005, and came 2nd in the prestigious board of the year contest in 2006 (Jelsoft, vBulletin). There was much controversy surrounding the contest as website owners claimed that JD should have won the top prize and that the winner used unethical methods to secure votes.
The site eventually lost the bulk of its traffic when I got busy with University and as Hilary Duff’s career took a different direction. At one point, JD got more traffic than Facebook in its infancy (Alexa rankings, 2004). I spent most of my teen years building similar websites and making money. When I was 17, I had an offer to the sell the website for $70,000 but I was emotionally attached and didn’t want to let go. I’d say that I learnt more about business running this single website than I did in my entire secondary education.
You can view the site in action (not quite) at http://www.juicyduff.com
