Social networks are becoming increasingly homogenized, with everything from text to short videos appearing across platforms and algorithms often burying creativity. This ubiquitous environment makes it harder than ever to truly get a sense of someone's vibe before deciding whether to follow them.
Shelf is an app that lets you create a personalized “storefront” of your media habits and connect with others based on the movies, shows, books, games, and music you watch. It also lets you track your progress while reading your favorite books or watching trending shows.
“If you look at internet culture in general, people are increasingly less likely to post selfies and more likely to post screenshots of what they're reading or watching or movie reviews. Essentially, it's about digging deeper into a person and trying to understand where they are in life. That's what Shelf is about,” Judd Esber, co-founder and CEO of Koodos Labs, the startup that developed Shelf, said in an interview.
Esber grew up writing anonymous online poetry and spent the early part of his career at YouTube in London from 2015 to 2018. During this time, he worked on the creator side of the Google subsidiary, helping people create content, grow their audience and monetize their work. This was a time when YouTube was growing its creator ecosystem in various emerging markets outside of the US.
The Cambridge University MSc graduate spent over three years at Google before returning to academia and enrolling at Harvard University to study consumer internet trends and academically research the internet, an experience that helped him conceive Shelf in a market saturated with social media apps with millions, even billions, of users.
“We built a bunch of products,” Esber told TechCrunch, “and none of them worked until Shelf came along, and Shelf was born out of that experience.”
How does it work?
Available for iOS and Android, the Shelf app lets you connect accounts associated with media like Apple Music, Goodreads, Netflix, Spotify, YouTube, and more, to create a customizable “storefront” web page that automatically updates based on your consumption progress. You can also manually add links to other internet services to your virtual shelf. You can also add links to your favorite TechCrunch articles, which you can then share with your followers.
The New York-based startup also plans to expand its list of supported services, including Steam for gamers.
“[A]”As humans and as people online, we are very multifaceted. We're not interested in music, movies, shows, all of those things. Adding support for specific categories not only broadens our user base but also deepens the use case for existing users,” Esber said.
You can choose the URL of your digital shelf as per your preference. Similarly, the app allows you to customize the interface by changing the background color, moving items around, etc. as per your preference.
Koodos plans to monetize Shelf by offering new customization options, and may also consider monetizing the insights the app uncovers, Esber told TechCrunch.
Unlike apps that use APIs to call data, Shelf works whether or not a platform has a first-party API. Typically, when a user selects a third-party service like Spotify or Apple Music from the Shelf UI, they are signed in (either via a redirect to that app or via a pop-up screen). Once the user is signed in, Esber can get all the information about the user's media consumption directly from the app.
Esber also said the startup is not using data taken from app-based lists of service users to train its AI, as is currently common practice with online platforms.
The data sharing is made possible through a technology called DataMover, and Koodos is expanding the solution to include other apps (though Esber wouldn't say which ones.) He compares DataMover to fintech company Plaid's data transfer network.
“Similarly [to Plaid]”We will also be able to provide users with data access to other applications,” he said.
Image credit: Koodos Labs
Personal Experience in Testing
Along with allowing users to create public storefronts, Shelf has also begun testing a private experience for select users who only want to track their own media consumption and don't want to share it.
“We want to create a long-lasting, enjoyable utility for everyone. Everyone has a bookshelf in their living room or at home, so why can't everyone have a Shelf?” says Esber.
Users have added 500 million items to Shelf, which was launched publicly this summer after beta testing late last year. Esber declined to disclose user numbers but said the number of shelves on the app is growing 40% month over month, and that users are visiting Shelf, on average, five times a week to check or update their own digital shelves or check out others' shelves.
Koodos has raised a total of $7 million from investors including First Round Capital, M13, Blockchain Capital, and IDEO, as well as founders of companies like Zynga and VSCO, with participation from Pinterest co-founder Evan Sharp, Dubsmash co-founder (and now VP at Reddit) Suchit Dash, and Harvard market design pioneers Professors John Deighton and Scott Kominers.