Dogs On Acid

Dogs On Acid

The DOA Homepage
URL	dogsonacid.com
Slogan	Where Music Talks!
Commercial?	Yes
Type of site	Portal
Registration	Yes
Available language(s)	English
Owner	Adam F, DJ Fresh, Grooverider and Sacha Cohen
Created by	Bad Company
Launched	January 29, 2001

Dogs On Acid (also known as its abbreviation DOA by its users), is a UK-based electronic music website, established in 2001.^[1]

History

Dogs On Acid began life as a community on Bad Company's website, bcrecordings.com, back in 2000. One of the group's members, Dan Fresh, intended the community to be a place to discuss up-and-coming releases, mixes and gigs. Because their community grew in popularity and its content more and more covered the entire drum and bass spectrum, it was decided to start a new website under the Dogs On Acid moniker in 2001, an unusual name that stuck when Dan blurted it out as a joke while having a drink and searching for a name^{[citation needed]}. Since its initiation the website grew more day by day and is currently home to the largest online drum and bass community^[2] and is arguably the largest website in its genre.^[3][4][5]

On April 27, 2010, the website reached 10 million posts from the forums, with almost 9 million posts on The Board and over a million on The Grid.^[6][7]

Activities

Next to a community which holds over 87.000 members, the website features: an Editorial section, stores selling merchandise and - in cooperation with Track It Down - online music downloads, an image gallery, an online radio and an audio section, showcasing the latest tracks from the scene. The Grid, the website's music production section, is the birthplace of many new D&B talent. Noisia, Mistabishi, Pendulum, Alix Perez, Danny Byrd and Data to name a few, were regular contributors before gaining any mainstream popularity. Next to this, most D&B artists and promoters are or were regular contributors to the community. Dogs On Acid also runs various music labels: Breakbeat Kaos, Dogs On Acid^[8] and Under Construction (See BBK Sublabels) and promotes and organises various parties worldwide.^[9]

Public perception, controversy and rivalry

Dogs on Acid's arch-rivals are Drum and Bass Arena. The rivalry spawns from the fact that both portals are arguably the two biggest content-filled websites for the drum and bass genre on the internet. Today the relationship between both forums are light-hearted, where both production sub-forums have competitions for best track and mixes; bringing the comprehensive community together.^[10][11] Much of DOA's users are considered more international whereas DnB Arena is a site mainly aimed at UK; although a few members post on both. Artists such as Mistabishi and Skream have since been ridiculed by the forum and no longer post.^[12]

Jungle Sound Gold

The Drum & Bass group Pendulum started much of their activity on DOA, before and during their time being signed to Breakbeat Kaos (BBK), posting on the board and helping other producers on production forum the 'Grid'. During this time DOA was to become the first board to get hit with any news of their releases, also causing the group to be hit with many questions on the production side. Following the success of Pendulum's Slam and Hold Your Colour, Fresh decided to release a compilation CD entitled Jungle Sound Gold Edition. Pendulum responded to the thread stating they had no idea about the release nor gave any permission. Rob Swire responded by admitting no knowledge of the album's release, and that it had nothing to do with the band. Rob also stated they gave Fresh & Adam F low quality tracks to be used for a set and not for releases.

We didn't approve and in fact strongly disapprove of the 'Junglesound Gold' artwork, especially in relation to our name being unfairly used as an advertisement - plainly an attempt to link 'Junglesound Gold' to the recent success of 'Hold Your Colour'.
As a result of the above, we do not endorse 'Junglesound Gold' at all.
- Pendulum.

^[13]

One of the few threads causing uproar within the forum and gaining over a thousand replies & 141,000 views in the space of 4 weeks from Rob's post.^[14] News of the scandal spread quickly, even being mentioned on Radio 1's Drum & Bass show only a week later. Fresh was also accused by various members for deviously capitalizing on Pendulum's sudden success. Since the incident, Fresh gave his statement (although by this point the CD was out) and Pendulum left the label. On the 18th of June 2007 Fresh released Pendulum's last 12" Single: Blood Sugar / Axle Grinder along with a special edition ‘Hold Your Colour’ CD.^[15]

Pendulum Vs DOA

Although Pendulum (which at that time included Rob Swire, Paul Harding and Gareth McGrillen) felt the forum began to become negative and cut ends with BBK & Fresh they continued posting on the portal.^[16] Once the track Granite was released Pendulum became ridiculed by various members for their change in style and being accused of "Selling out" for mainstream success. Although the album was highly successful the band continued to receive heavy sarcasm and accusations for killing the genre from various members, described by the board as 'haters'. Pendulum responded by saying "if we 'killed drum and bass' last time, this is the final nail in its coffin." As the album continued to do well in the mainstream (including Propane Nightmares peaking at #9 in the UK Singles Chart) the band continued to be criticised by DnB enthusiasts, to the point where in March 2009 the band were booed at the Drum and Bass awards from certain enthusiasts for "selling out" "sounding more rock and having a different style to their preceding album".^[17][18] After receiving a heavy amount of criticism Pendulum decided to respond one more time and left the forum and have never posted since.^[19]

Today

The Grid (Production side) holds monthly Q&A Sessions where posters and members get to ask (mainly productive) questions to notable producers and artists. Members of the grid also collaborate to their 'Grid wiki'.^[20] The board holds more ambiguous discussions than in its early days. Regardless of the fact that Drum & Bass Isn't discussed as much this hasn't hindered the website; only leading them to receive just as much members as before. The board is still favoured for having discussions and debates on varied music and not just drum and Bass, it brings even notable DJs to post their opinions such as radio one's Grooverider or Mary Anne Hobbs. Mary Anne announced during an interview "Everything happens on-line. The forums and the bloggers are running things - dubstepforum.com and dogsonacid.com are phenomenal".^[21][22] The forum is often compared with dubstepforum like it once was with DNBA.

Although Fresh is still listed as a shareholder of Dogs on Acid, he recently mentioned that he no longer has anything to do with the running of the forum or website. It is unknown whether he still holds his share. With a high amount of lolcats and memes the board has often been described as being a secondary 4chan.^{[citation needed]} The forum is ridiculed for holding trolls and many Aliases.^{[citation needed]}

Developments (DOA V3)

The website is based on an old version of VBulletin and was purportedly scheduled for a major refurbish in 2010.^{[citation needed]} The aim of this development was to make the website more of a Web 2.0 community^{[says who?]} involving mash-ups from soundcloud and other MP3 stores. According to an old thread, some of these changes were purportedly being tested around 2008.^[23]

It was announced on Friday 17 December 2010 that 'DOA V3' would go live on the following Monday.^[24] However, this failed to happen with the site's owner instead stating that there was "no exact date" for the changeover.^[25]

During the week of 17th January 2011, many of the bugs that plagued the site redesign were worked on, and while everything is not 100%, the new features are being utilized.

Accolades

• Nominated for Best Website at the Accelerated Culture Awards 2003, 2nd place^[26]
• Nominated for Best Website at the BBC XtraBass Awards 2007, 2nd place^[27]
• Mentioned in the July 2008 issue of KMag as one of "the top 100 most important moments in Drum & Bass"^[28]

See also

• Breakbeat Kaos
• Drum and bass
• Drum and Bass Arena
• Jungle
• Pendulum

References

1. ^ Wolfram Alpha Statistics Wolfram Alpha: Accessed July 18th, 2009
2. ^ Statistical Comparison Of Music Forums Big-Boards: Accessed July 20th, 2009
3. ^ Dogs On Acid And Drum & Bass Arena Statistical Comparison Alexa: Accessed July 18th, 2009
4. ^ How to co-ordinate a successful urban PR campaign. (PR & Plugging). access my library: Accessed July 22nd, 2009
5. ^ FRESH (Bad Company, Breakbeat Kaos, Dogs on Acid, UK) !!!!!!! Illegal party: Accessed July 22nd, 2009
6. ^ "DOGS ON ACID REACHES 10 MILLION POSTS" Dogs On Acid: Accessed April 27th, 2010
7. ^ "Dogs On Acid Reaches 10 Million Posts" Its not just music: Accessed April 28th, 2010
8. ^ Discogs listing of the Dogs on Acid label releases
9. ^ Drum in the sun Romford Recorder: Accessed July 22nd, 2009
10. ^ "DOA vs DNBA 2005 Production Forum Results" dnb Forum: Accessed July 19th, 2009
11. ^ "Maffia Bologna: prossimo live" Girodivite: Accessed July 22nd, 2009
12. ^ "Mistabishi's Apology" Dubplate Digest: Accessed October 29th, 2009
13. ^ Re: 'junglesound Gold'. Dogs On Acid (01 March 2006). Retrieved on 25 September 2010.
14. ^ "Re: 'junglesound Gold'" DOA: Accessed July 20th, 2009
15. ^ " BBK/PENDULUM Joint Press Statement (08/12/06)" DOA: Accessed July 20th, 2009
16. ^ "PENDULUM/INTERVIEW ISSUE 57" ATM Magazine: Accessed July 20th, 2009
17. ^ "Pendulum attack critics" Teletext: Accessed July 21st, 2009
18. ^ "Sultans of swing - Pendulum Interview" Edinburgh Festival Guide: Accessed July 21st, 2009
19. ^ "Pendulum strike back on drum and bass forum" BeatPortal: Accessed July 21st, 2009
20. ^ "Welcome to DNBWiki.com! " DnB WIki: Accessed July 22, 2009
21. ^ "Mary Anne Hobbs: My life in media" The Independent: Accessed July 22nd, 2009
22. ^ "Internet review: DogsOnAcid more than a PETA nightmare" The Activist: Accessed July 22nd, 2009
23. ^ "http://www.dogsonacid.com/showthread.php?threadid=582757" DOA: Accessed Sept 03, 2009
24. ^ [1]
25. ^ [2]
26. ^ "Official Accelerated Culture Awards 2003 Results" Drum & Bass Forum: Accessed July 19th, 2009
27. ^ "BBC XtraBass Awards 2007 Winners" BBC: Accessed July 18th, 2009
28. ^ "The Top 100 Most Important Moments In Drum & Bass" Yudu: Accessed July 18th, 2009