The Challenge
Tony Kent built AroundSounds from a hobby into a community of over 1 million followers on Facebook — a 60s music page that grew purely on passion, personality, and consistently great content. Then overnight, Facebook changed its rules on live music streaming. Despite holding all the necessary licences, AroundSounds lost the ability to go live. No warning, no appeal — just gone.
With daily live shows at the heart of what AroundSounds offers, Tony needed an independent platform fast. One he owned and controlled, that his audience could find and use easily.
What We Built
We designed and built a full-stack web platform for AroundSounds — a Progressive Web App covering the complete member journey:
- A public-facing website showcasing the AroundSounds proposition
- Free daily live shows accessible to any visitor
- An always-on homepage radio player
- A free members area with access to the live video stream
- A paid subscription tier for archive radio shows and bonus content
- Stripe integration for subscription management, using AroundSounds' existing payment setup
- A real-time chat room for community interaction during shows
- Member profile management and self-serve account controls
- Email database management via API to an external platform
- Admin interfaces and controls for the AroundSounds team
How It Works
After trialling Vimeo and Cloudflare for video delivery, we partnered with XPTV.live — a platform purpose-built for live streaming and radio. XPTV provides both the video streaming player and radio player, embedded directly into the site and app.
The membership and subscription layer sits on top of Stripe, which AroundSounds was already using. This meant no migration headaches — we built around what was already working.
The front end is delivered as a PWA, making it installable on any device and accessible without an app store. The backend handles member authentication, subscription status, profile management, and admin controls for the AroundSounds team to manage content and members day-to-day.
The Outcome
AroundSounds now operates a fully independent streaming platform — outside Facebook's control entirely. Daily live shows continue uninterrupted. Members have a dedicated space for archive content and community chat. Tony and his team manage everything through the site's admin interfaces.
The community Tony started on 30th July 2018 — with a handful of family and friends' likes — now spans three decade-themed pages (60s, 70s, 80s) with a combined following of over 3.2 million, and continues to grow.
What We Learned
Platform risk is real, and it can move fast. AroundSounds is a clear example of what happens when a community is built entirely on rented land — one policy change and the ground shifts. The right response isn't to abandon social media, but to ensure there's a platform you own that can carry the weight when external platforms change the rules.
Building around existing infrastructure — Stripe, XPTV — meant we could move quickly without reinventing the wheel. Where possible, integrate what's already working.
Visit AroundSounds: aroundsounds.co.uk