 |
 | |
Type of site | Digital music |
|---|---|
| Available in | English |
| Founded | 2005 |
| Dissolved | 2023 |
| Headquarters | U.S. |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Owner | MediaLab AI Inc.[1] |
| Founder | Marcus Frasier |
| Key people |
|
| URL | datpiff |
| Registration | Optional |
| Current status | Inactive |
DatPiff was an online audio distribution platform specializing in hip-hop, rap, and urban music that launched in 2005. It was headquartered in Pennsylvania.[3] The site was founded in the spring of 2005 by Marcus Frasier.[4][5] It was owned by MediaLab.[2] In March 2023, DatPiff experienced severe server outages.[6][2] The following month, it announced that it had partnered with the Internet Archive to archive the site's music catalog.[7] The site no longer hosts music but does link to the Internet Archive's collection.[2] Despite this, the archived catalog completely disappeared from Internet Archive not long after its publication and has yet to be reuploaded officially by DatPiff, rendering only a small percentage of mixtapes from the platform available on Internet Archive.[8][9]
Features
A key feature of DatPiff was that unregistered users were allowed to download any mixtape uploaded to the site that has been sponsored. Registered users were permitted a limited number of downloads of non-sponsored mixtapes per day. Premium paid users had an unlimited number of downloads of any mixtape. Mixtapes could be streamed by any user. Premium content could also be purchased.[10]
Users could register as either an artist or fan - the key difference being that artists upload their work to the site while fans may only listen to these works.
DatPiff had mobile applications for iOS (iPhone and iPad), Android, Windows Phone 7, BlackBerry, and WebOS.
References
- ^ "Brands | MediaLab". www.medialab.la. Retrieved June 7, 2023.
- ^ a b c d Josephs, Brian (June 28, 2023). "Mixtape Sites Like DatPiff Propelled Rap. Can They Be Preserved?". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on June 28, 2023. Retrieved December 12, 2023.
- ^ "Idle Media Inc". Bloomberg Businessweek. Retrieved July 16, 2012.
{{cite magazine}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link) - ^ Humphrey, Michael (August 4, 2011). "Datpiff: How Love For Mixtapes Grew To Lil Wayne Levels". Forbes. Archived from the original on November 30, 2018. Retrieved November 29, 2018.
- ^ Garvey, Meaghan (December 16, 2014). "The Minds Behind Music's Biggest Tech Advances in the Last 10 Years". Complex. Archived from the original on November 30, 2018. Retrieved November 29, 2018.
- ^ Martinez, Jose (March 14, 2023). "DatPiff Mourned Amid Shutdown Speculation, Service Assures Hip-Hop Heads 'We Promise, We Are Still Here'". Complex. Retrieved February 12, 2026.
- ^ Gee, Andre (January 8, 2024). "The Internet Archive Now Hosts One of the World's Biggest Collections of Rap Mixtapes". Rolling Stone. Retrieved February 12, 2026.
- ^ "Reddit - The heart of the internet". www.reddit.com. Retrieved February 23, 2026.
- ^ Manny Faces (September 30, 2024). EXCLUSIVE: DatPiff Hip Hop Mixtape Archive DISAPPEARS Overnight! Is It Gone Forever?. Retrieved February 23, 2026 – via YouTube.
- ^ Martin, Williams (June 7, 2020). "What is DatPiff?". TechGeek. Archived from the original on June 11, 2020. Retrieved June 11, 2020.
