WEBVTT - A Discussion on Discord 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to tex Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:12.119 --> 0:00:14.800 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.960 --> 0:00:18.160 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio 0:00:18.280 --> 0:00:21.760 and I love all things tech and I received a 0:00:21.840 --> 0:00:25.239 request on Twitter to do an episode about the history 0:00:25.400 --> 0:00:30.040 of Discord, the communications platform. Now, if you don't know 0:00:30.240 --> 0:00:33.440 what Discord is, it does help to get a quick overview. 0:00:33.479 --> 0:00:36.040 So from a high level, Discord of software that let's 0:00:36.120 --> 0:00:40.400 users chat with each other either through texting or with 0:00:40.560 --> 0:00:45.080 voice communication or video chat. And it has other features 0:00:45.080 --> 0:00:48.000 as well, and it grew out of gaming culture. We've 0:00:48.000 --> 0:00:51.479 got two founders to talk about, so let's start with 0:00:51.640 --> 0:00:56.120 a man named Jason Citron. He grew up playing video games. 0:00:56.400 --> 0:00:59.960 He received a Nintendo in ne s. The Nintendo entertain 0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:03.160 was stem a groundbreaking console, the one that brought home 0:01:03.320 --> 0:01:06.720 video games back from the dead after the Great Crash 0:01:06.760 --> 0:01:09.600 of the early nineteen eighties, and he was only five 0:01:09.680 --> 0:01:11.840 years old when he got that. He said that when 0:01:11.920 --> 0:01:13.760 he was a kid, all he really wanted to do 0:01:13.840 --> 0:01:16.240 was play games on the n e S and his 0:01:16.280 --> 0:01:18.399 parents essentially told him that if he did all of 0:01:18.440 --> 0:01:21.120 his homework, he could spend as much time playing games 0:01:21.160 --> 0:01:24.560 as he liked. So while other parents might tell their kids, hey, 0:01:24.840 --> 0:01:27.440 you know, you should go outside and play, or otherwise 0:01:27.520 --> 0:01:29.880 limit their screen time, Citron was more or less given 0:01:29.920 --> 0:01:33.000 carte blanche to do all the gaming he wanted to, 0:01:33.080 --> 0:01:35.200 as long as he didn't put off homework or anything 0:01:35.240 --> 0:01:38.160 like that. He has said that when he was around 0:01:38.160 --> 0:01:40.840 twelve or thirteen, a friend of his taught him some 0:01:41.120 --> 0:01:45.800 early que Basic programming tricks during a sleepover. So que 0:01:45.840 --> 0:01:50.320 Basic is a very simple programming language, and Citron found 0:01:50.320 --> 0:01:53.760 it really interesting. So of course, the first thing he 0:01:53.840 --> 0:01:56.560 really wanted to do was to make a game. So 0:01:56.720 --> 0:01:59.120 he and his buddy stayed up late while everyone else 0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:02.440 was asleep, and they got to work programming out a 0:02:02.560 --> 0:02:05.760 text adventure. For those of you who have never played 0:02:06.120 --> 0:02:08.400 a text adventure, it's pretty much what it sounds like. 0:02:08.480 --> 0:02:12.120 The game presents the player with text and describes an 0:02:12.240 --> 0:02:15.480 environment and any actions that are going on. Then the 0:02:15.520 --> 0:02:19.560 player types in a command, and if the programmers anticipated 0:02:19.600 --> 0:02:22.800 that command, you get a response that progresses the game 0:02:22.919 --> 0:02:26.040 or perhaps ends it if you made the wrong choice. Now, 0:02:26.040 --> 0:02:29.080 if the programmers didn't anticipate the command, you're likely to 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:32.200 encounter a failed message. So, for example, if you were 0:02:32.240 --> 0:02:36.120 the type look under rock, and the programmers didn't anticipate 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:39.400 that action, you might receive the generic response I'm sorry, 0:02:39.480 --> 0:02:41.320 I don't know how to do that. But if they 0:02:41.360 --> 0:02:43.919 did anticipate it, you might get something like you lift 0:02:44.000 --> 0:02:47.000 up the rock and you see an old rusty key, 0:02:47.160 --> 0:02:49.360 or maybe you get you lift up the rock and 0:02:49.400 --> 0:02:52.440 see dirt. What did you expect? It all depends upon 0:02:52.480 --> 0:02:55.360 the programmers. And just for the record, I love old 0:02:55.360 --> 0:02:58.720 text adventure games. Some of them get wicked hard because 0:02:58.760 --> 0:03:02.959 programmers really went out of their way to make obtuse puzzles. Anyway, 0:03:03.040 --> 0:03:06.160 let's get back to Citron. As he got older, he 0:03:06.280 --> 0:03:09.200 decided he didn't want to just play games. He wanted 0:03:09.240 --> 0:03:12.400 to make them as well, like as a job, not 0:03:12.560 --> 0:03:16.080 just as a hobby. He enrolled in Full Sale University, 0:03:16.200 --> 0:03:19.680 which is a private, for profit university in Florida. I 0:03:19.760 --> 0:03:21.799 know it best as the home of n x T, 0:03:22.200 --> 0:03:24.760 which is kind of the developmental branch of the w 0:03:24.760 --> 0:03:28.720 w E, the professional wrestling organization. Anyway, the school is 0:03:28.760 --> 0:03:33.119 known for its programs and feels like computer animation, audio design, 0:03:33.200 --> 0:03:36.400 and that sort of thing. Citron graduated in two thousand 0:03:36.480 --> 0:03:39.960 four with a Bachelor's of Science in game design and development. 0:03:40.520 --> 0:03:43.559 He went on to develop for a few different game studios, 0:03:43.600 --> 0:03:47.000 like Papaya Studio, which, if I'm doing my math correctly, 0:03:47.200 --> 0:03:50.880 would have probably been working on titles like Disney Princess 0:03:51.240 --> 0:03:56.280 Enchanted Journey and Windy Woo Homecoming Warrior Kick In Challenge. 0:03:56.920 --> 0:03:58.720 He was there for less than a year before he 0:03:58.760 --> 0:04:02.520 moved over to Storm Runt Studios, which was probably working 0:04:02.520 --> 0:04:07.240 on licensed properties like Aragon and The Spiderwick Chronicles. Citron 0:04:07.280 --> 0:04:09.160 stayed there for about a year and a half before 0:04:09.160 --> 0:04:12.839 he moved over to Double Fine Productions in two thousand six. Now, 0:04:12.880 --> 0:04:15.520 before I chat about that little part of his career, 0:04:15.880 --> 0:04:18.760 I did want to mention that Papaia Studios and storm 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:23.000 Front are both no more. Storm Front actually folded first 0:04:23.120 --> 0:04:25.880 in two thousand and eight after Sierra Entertainment, which was 0:04:25.920 --> 0:04:29.880 set to publish the company's next game, closed down, and 0:04:29.880 --> 0:04:32.919 I should probably do an episode about Stormfront at some point. 0:04:33.279 --> 0:04:37.679 Papaia Studios stuck around till or so. I'm not actually 0:04:37.680 --> 0:04:40.280 sure what happened with that studio other than it went 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:43.719 out of business. I couldn't find more detailed information about 0:04:43.720 --> 0:04:47.000 what caused it to do that anyway, onto Double Fine. 0:04:47.480 --> 0:04:50.640 This company, founded by Tim Schaefer, is known for games 0:04:50.680 --> 0:04:54.440 like Psycho Knots and also the remaster version of Grim 0:04:54.520 --> 0:04:59.159 Van Dango, the Brutal Legends game, and more. Citron joined 0:04:59.160 --> 0:05:01.800 that team in two in six, a year after the 0:05:01.880 --> 0:05:04.880 first Psycho Knots game had come out. Citron was there 0:05:04.920 --> 0:05:08.480 for eight months and left in June of two thousand seven. 0:05:09.000 --> 0:05:12.560 Now when you hear about these relatively short stints with companies, 0:05:13.000 --> 0:05:15.160 with just you know, a few months here or a 0:05:15.240 --> 0:05:17.400 year and a half there, you might get the feeling 0:05:17.400 --> 0:05:20.359 that young Citron had itchy feet and he couldn't settle down. 0:05:20.720 --> 0:05:24.040 And that is possibly the case, but it's also possible 0:05:24.040 --> 0:05:27.400 that Citron was working for these companies on a contract basis. 0:05:27.920 --> 0:05:31.080 A lot of studios will bring in freelance game developers 0:05:31.080 --> 0:05:34.320 to help with titles that are in production. These developers 0:05:34.360 --> 0:05:39.679 work alongside full time salaried employees until their contract is over, 0:05:40.000 --> 0:05:42.839 whereupon the freelancer might have to head off in search 0:05:42.960 --> 0:05:45.400 of their next gig. They might get resigned to a 0:05:45.440 --> 0:05:48.680 new contract, but chances are they may just have to 0:05:48.680 --> 0:05:51.000 try and line up their next job. And I'm not 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:52.919 sure if that's what was going on with Citron, but 0:05:52.960 --> 0:05:56.400 I figure it's a pretty fair guess. He had some 0:05:56.480 --> 0:05:59.000 bigger plans in store. However, He really wanted to try 0:05:59.080 --> 0:06:02.560 and create his own own company, but Citron also recognized 0:06:02.600 --> 0:06:06.120 that he didn't really have that kind of experience or background. 0:06:06.320 --> 0:06:09.240 He was a developer, not an entrepreneur, at least not 0:06:09.360 --> 0:06:13.240 yet anyway. He applied to and was accepted by you web, 0:06:13.520 --> 0:06:16.680 which is a company that helps develop people into entrepreneurs. 0:06:17.040 --> 0:06:20.480 The focus on fields like app development and gaming. You 0:06:20.600 --> 0:06:24.800 web provides an environment and initial funding for product development, 0:06:25.200 --> 0:06:28.840 sort of like the seed money to get a business going. 0:06:29.560 --> 0:06:32.080 At you Web. Citron began to work with a developer 0:06:32.200 --> 0:06:35.440 named Danielle Castley, and the two of them created a 0:06:35.480 --> 0:06:39.760 game for iOS devices. It was called Aurora Faint and 0:06:39.839 --> 0:06:44.400 it was part RPG, part Tetris like puzzle game. Citron 0:06:44.440 --> 0:06:47.520 described it as quote a puzzle based m m O 0:06:47.720 --> 0:06:51.839 RPG for the iPhone end quote. M m O RPG 0:06:52.000 --> 0:06:56.400 says for massively multiplayer online role playing games, so a 0:06:56.480 --> 0:07:00.520 game that supports lots of players simultaneously and as role 0:07:00.560 --> 0:07:03.919 playing elements to it. The first game was actually fairly modest, 0:07:03.960 --> 0:07:06.840 a single player game with some leader boards, but the 0:07:06.920 --> 0:07:11.000 second attempt was far more ambitious, with chat rooms, asynchronous 0:07:11.080 --> 0:07:16.200 multiplayer support, ghost battling, and more. Ghost battling is where 0:07:16.440 --> 0:07:20.600 you create a profile, and when you're offline, your profile 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:24.760 is able to play against other players and perform as 0:07:24.800 --> 0:07:28.000 if you are controlling it to some degree. Citron and 0:07:28.080 --> 0:07:31.320 castlely recognize that players liked having ways to interact with 0:07:31.320 --> 0:07:34.600 one another, whether it was to form friendships or talk 0:07:34.680 --> 0:07:37.640 some smack, or you know, just have a conversation about 0:07:37.680 --> 0:07:40.280 anything at all. And you could see that some of 0:07:40.320 --> 0:07:43.080 the concepts that would later transition into what would become 0:07:43.080 --> 0:07:47.400 features and discord we're taking shape. The experience convinced Citron 0:07:47.400 --> 0:07:49.720 to try something bigger. He wanted to build not just 0:07:49.760 --> 0:07:53.240 a game, but a platform for games on iOS. He 0:07:53.320 --> 0:07:57.240 pitched it as Xbox Live but for iPhones, complete with 0:07:57.400 --> 0:08:01.280 chat and video board features. He decided to quote, just 0:08:01.440 --> 0:08:04.680 announce it and see if people would want it end quote, 0:08:05.320 --> 0:08:08.520 which is a pretty seat of your pants approach, like 0:08:08.800 --> 0:08:10.840 you don't even know if you can build it yet, 0:08:11.600 --> 0:08:13.560 You're really just kind of fishing to see if there 0:08:13.560 --> 0:08:17.120 are any bites, and there were. The developers put out 0:08:17.160 --> 0:08:20.480 their announcement, which tech Crunch would pick up and publish. 0:08:20.680 --> 0:08:23.560 So now lots of people were seeing it, and the 0:08:23.600 --> 0:08:26.800 next thing they knew they had four hundred developers indicate 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:31.480 their interest in this project. Citron and Castley founded open Faint, 0:08:31.920 --> 0:08:35.280 which would focus on building out this platform, and when 0:08:35.280 --> 0:08:38.040 the company launched in March two thousand nine, there were 0:08:38.040 --> 0:08:42.240 fifteen developers signed on with thirty games for this platform, 0:08:42.920 --> 0:08:46.360 not games from open feint, but games that would use 0:08:46.480 --> 0:08:50.080 open feint as the platform. At first, the open feint 0:08:50.120 --> 0:08:52.360 team was really small, with just four or five people 0:08:52.400 --> 0:08:54.960 working on it in the early days. By the end 0:08:55.000 --> 0:08:57.480 of that first year that number was up to fifteen, 0:08:57.640 --> 0:09:00.400 and two years in it was at sixty. And then 0:09:00.480 --> 0:09:04.520 a Japanese mobile game company called g r E or 0:09:04.960 --> 0:09:08.480 GREE made an offer that the founders could not refuse. 0:09:08.600 --> 0:09:12.600 They acquired open feint for the princely sum of one 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:16.960 hundred four million dollars. Now, sit Tron figured he'd stay 0:09:17.000 --> 0:09:20.320 put as the leader of open feint at least for 0:09:20.360 --> 0:09:24.040 a while. In an interview with Business Insider, he said, quote, 0:09:24.400 --> 0:09:27.280 I will be sticking around for a while. My personal ambition, 0:09:27.400 --> 0:09:30.040 it might come off as a little naive but it's 0:09:30.040 --> 0:09:33.000 a change the world kind of thing. I see open 0:09:33.040 --> 0:09:35.920 Faint as an opportunity for me to help developers create 0:09:35.920 --> 0:09:39.800 what I call shared experiences. You play games, right, so 0:09:39.920 --> 0:09:44.000 you've had experiences like Mario Kart or Fifa where you're 0:09:44.040 --> 0:09:46.600 playing with buddies and right as you're about to win, 0:09:46.960 --> 0:09:49.560 your friend comes up behind you and wins. You throw 0:09:49.600 --> 0:09:51.840 the controller on the ground and yell and scream at 0:09:51.840 --> 0:09:54.600 each other. Those moments of connecting with your friends where 0:09:54.600 --> 0:09:58.000 you can laugh and share like that are so powerful. 0:09:58.559 --> 0:10:02.560 End quote. So again we see yet more signs of 0:10:02.600 --> 0:10:06.400 this idea of communication and community, things that we become 0:10:06.440 --> 0:10:09.400 really important. So if you've used Discord, all of this 0:10:09.520 --> 0:10:12.400 probably sounds a little familiar, right, But we've got another 0:10:12.440 --> 0:10:14.800 founder we need to talk about. So we're gonna leave 0:10:14.840 --> 0:10:17.520 Citron at this stage in his career and switch gears 0:10:17.520 --> 0:10:22.120 to talk about Stennislav Vishnevsky. Now, I gotta preface this 0:10:22.200 --> 0:10:26.040 by saying I found way more information about Citron than 0:10:26.080 --> 0:10:30.000 I did about Vishnevsky. Uh, Citron has been pretty you know, 0:10:30.200 --> 0:10:33.720 much the face of Discord. But here's what I can 0:10:33.800 --> 0:10:38.079 tell you. Vishnevsky earned a degree at California State University 0:10:38.120 --> 0:10:41.640 at Northridge, presumably in computer science or some other field 0:10:41.640 --> 0:10:46.600 related to software engineering. He speaks Russian. In two thousand nine, 0:10:46.679 --> 0:10:49.880 he worked for a software company called Kassamba Incorporated. That 0:10:50.200 --> 0:10:54.440 quote focused on developing technology solutions within the healthcare industry. 0:10:54.520 --> 0:10:59.240 End quote. That's from Visionevsky's LinkedIn profile, which I found 0:10:59.320 --> 0:11:02.040 very useful trying to find out more about his history. 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:05.400 He was there for about eight months. In the meantime, 0:11:05.440 --> 0:11:08.600 he was also working on his own project called guild Work. 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:12.720 Stanislav had developed tools for a Final Fantasy title that 0:11:12.760 --> 0:11:15.800 he recognized could be useful if adapted for other games, 0:11:16.160 --> 0:11:20.720 specifically m m O RPGs. Many m m O RPGs 0:11:20.760 --> 0:11:26.480 allow players to create associations within the games themselves, called guilds, 0:11:26.520 --> 0:11:29.480 but depending on the game, the tools that players have 0:11:29.600 --> 0:11:32.960 at their disposal might make guild management a bit of 0:11:32.960 --> 0:11:36.400 a chore, so some guilds would turn to other tools 0:11:36.440 --> 0:11:41.000 to help coordinate efforts within the guild and facilitate guild communication. 0:11:41.520 --> 0:11:44.320 Guild Work grew out of that need and would expand 0:11:44.360 --> 0:11:47.720 to allow for guild hosting as well. Also, it would 0:11:47.760 --> 0:11:52.160 provide the foothold that the company Discord would need later on. 0:11:52.280 --> 0:11:55.040 I'll explain when we get there. So his next job 0:11:55.240 --> 0:11:58.320 was as a software engineer at a company called Kabam, 0:11:58.960 --> 0:12:02.560 which developed social games like Kingdoms of Camelot. He was 0:12:02.600 --> 0:12:04.360 there for less than a year, leaving at the end 0:12:04.400 --> 0:12:07.560 of twenty eleven, and then he joined that Japanese game 0:12:07.600 --> 0:12:12.080 company I mentioned earlier called Gree International Incorporated in early 0:12:13.720 --> 0:12:16.880 So gree had acquired open Faint in two thousand eleven 0:12:17.160 --> 0:12:21.520 and Stan joined Green in And now we've got our 0:12:21.600 --> 0:12:25.280 two Discord co founders working at the same general company, 0:12:25.600 --> 0:12:28.880 with Citron still leading the Open Faint team within Gree. 0:12:28.920 --> 0:12:32.000 But shortly after that, Citron would found a new company 0:12:32.200 --> 0:12:36.320 initially called Hammer and Chisel, and Vishnevsky would move over 0:12:36.360 --> 0:12:40.840 to join on as a craftsman. According to Vishnevsky's LinkedIn profile, 0:12:40.840 --> 0:12:44.640 which I think is cool. An early project of THEIRS 0:12:44.760 --> 0:12:47.559 was called uh Fates Forever. It was a game, a 0:12:47.679 --> 0:12:51.280 mobile mobile game for tablets and smartphones, and it was 0:12:51.320 --> 0:12:55.960 a multiplayer online battle arena or mobile similar to games 0:12:55.960 --> 0:12:59.800 like League of Legends Dota to or smite the game 0:13:00.120 --> 0:13:02.680 and get a whole lot of traction. It did receive 0:13:02.880 --> 0:13:05.679 good reviews, it's just didn't get, you know, widely adopted. 0:13:06.200 --> 0:13:09.599 Vishnevsky was a developer on that title, and he campaigned 0:13:09.600 --> 0:13:12.000 for the freedom to work on tools and features that 0:13:12.040 --> 0:13:15.000 would allow players to communicate with one another in game. 0:13:15.800 --> 0:13:18.959 This work, which aligned with Citron's earlier attempts with Aurora 0:13:19.000 --> 0:13:21.719 Faint and Open Faint, soon became a bigger deal than 0:13:21.760 --> 0:13:25.040 the game that it spun off from, and so we 0:13:25.080 --> 0:13:29.520 saw the convergence of efforts to create opportunities for gamers 0:13:29.559 --> 0:13:32.840 to communicate with one another while playing games, and these 0:13:32.920 --> 0:13:35.240 efforts would combine to form the seeds of a new 0:13:35.280 --> 0:13:39.800 software solution, which would ultimately become Discord. I'll talk more 0:13:40.040 --> 0:13:45.080 about the coalescing of Discord in just a moment, but 0:13:45.240 --> 0:13:56.240 first let's take a quick break. So before we dive 0:13:56.280 --> 0:13:59.080 into Discord proper, let's talk a bit more about what 0:13:59.280 --> 0:14:02.280 made Jay and in Stanislav feel like it was something 0:14:02.320 --> 0:14:04.960 worth doing in the first place. Now, there are a 0:14:04.960 --> 0:14:08.199 lot of multiplayer games out there, and obviously the whole 0:14:08.240 --> 0:14:12.200 appeal to these games is that you're playing with other 0:14:12.559 --> 0:14:17.200 real people. You're all simultaneously in the game, and sometimes 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:20.200 you want to be able to chat with folks. This 0:14:20.240 --> 0:14:23.240 is particularly true for team based games, in which chatting 0:14:23.240 --> 0:14:26.360 with your teammates is key to coordinating a strategy and 0:14:26.400 --> 0:14:31.880 being effective against other teams or against nonplayer characters. But 0:14:32.000 --> 0:14:34.000 the fact of the matter is a lot of these 0:14:34.080 --> 0:14:38.480 multiplayer platforms are pretty awful when it comes to supporting 0:14:38.560 --> 0:14:42.320 team or multiplayer chat. Now, some are better than others, 0:14:42.360 --> 0:14:44.280 but in a lot of cases, it feels as though 0:14:44.320 --> 0:14:48.520 the actual communication tools are more of an afterthought. In 0:14:48.520 --> 0:14:51.480 a way that is understandable. I mean, the team needs 0:14:51.520 --> 0:14:55.120 to make sure that the actual gameplay elements of whatever 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:58.640 the game title is happen to be solid. It wouldn't 0:14:58.680 --> 0:15:00.920 be much fun if you joined a multiplayer game that 0:15:00.960 --> 0:15:04.960 had great communication tools but the game itself was terrible. 0:15:05.240 --> 0:15:08.280 I mean, yeah, you'd probably be able to communicate easily, 0:15:08.480 --> 0:15:11.240 but you would all likely spend your time complaining about 0:15:11.240 --> 0:15:15.080 how crappy the game was. Like Jason had said several 0:15:15.160 --> 0:15:18.600 years earlier, he really loved that experience of playing a 0:15:18.640 --> 0:15:21.320 game in the same physical space as his friends, Like 0:15:21.360 --> 0:15:23.080 you're all in the living room, all on the couch, 0:15:23.080 --> 0:15:26.040 and you're playing elbow to elbow and being able to 0:15:26.080 --> 0:15:28.760 talk in real time while playing the game, but the 0:15:28.800 --> 0:15:32.280 tools available to gamers around twelve or so were, you know, 0:15:32.440 --> 0:15:35.920 fairly limited, like teams speak in Skype or the two 0:15:35.920 --> 0:15:39.720 big ones, and they also tended to be really resourced heavy. 0:15:39.760 --> 0:15:41.960 So if you were trying to run a game and 0:15:42.440 --> 0:15:46.560 this separate voice over Internet protocol program, you know, like Skype, 0:15:46.960 --> 0:15:49.640 your computer might start chugging a bit and your gaming 0:15:49.640 --> 0:15:52.800 experience could suffer because now your CPU has to deal 0:15:52.800 --> 0:15:55.560 with not just the demands of the game, but whatever 0:15:55.600 --> 0:15:59.240 communications software you're running at the same time. Those were 0:15:59.280 --> 0:16:01.840 some of the thoughts driving the push to develop better 0:16:02.000 --> 0:16:06.200 in game communication tools for Fates Forever, the game that 0:16:06.440 --> 0:16:09.880 Hammer and Chisel was working on, except the team recognized 0:16:09.920 --> 0:16:13.120 that it might be better to develop something more broad, 0:16:13.600 --> 0:16:17.280 something that could stand as its own communication platform and 0:16:17.320 --> 0:16:20.360 not be tied to a specific game title, and so 0:16:20.440 --> 0:16:23.680 Citron made the call to shift the focus to creating 0:16:23.760 --> 0:16:28.000 the platform that could serve all games, similar to how 0:16:28.000 --> 0:16:31.040 he wanted to make an Xbox Live environment for iOS 0:16:31.120 --> 0:16:35.920 devices years earlier. It wasn't an easy decision, though, because 0:16:35.920 --> 0:16:39.240 it meant backing off of Fates Forever, It meant abandoning 0:16:39.320 --> 0:16:42.720 the game that they had been working on, and had launched, 0:16:43.360 --> 0:16:45.720 and this was not long after it had launched. It 0:16:45.760 --> 0:16:47.760 was like a year later, not even a full year, 0:16:48.280 --> 0:16:51.280 and the game died in early death. It also meant 0:16:51.440 --> 0:16:55.280 that he had to layoff the five full time employees 0:16:55.320 --> 0:16:58.080 who had been working on the game, so it was 0:16:58.080 --> 0:17:01.000 a big decision and not an easy one. Hammer and 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:04.960 Chisel then evolved into Discord the company with Citron a 0:17:05.080 --> 0:17:08.879 CEO and Vishnevsky as Chief Technology Officer or ct O. 0:17:09.560 --> 0:17:12.280 The team began to lay out what they wanted to 0:17:12.600 --> 0:17:16.080 achieve with this service. The Discord software needed to give 0:17:16.080 --> 0:17:19.680 gamers the ability to create rooms for chat. It needed 0:17:19.720 --> 0:17:22.920 to support text chat, voice chat, and then later on 0:17:23.040 --> 0:17:26.680 even video chat. It needed to be a lightweight type 0:17:26.680 --> 0:17:29.080 of apps, something that wouldn't put too big a strain 0:17:29.160 --> 0:17:31.840 on the hardware. After all, the original idea was that 0:17:32.359 --> 0:17:35.000 Discord was for gamers, and a lot of gamers really 0:17:35.040 --> 0:17:39.480 obsessed over getting the most out of their gaming rigs settings. 0:17:40.000 --> 0:17:42.840 You don't want to compromise on the gaming experience because 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:46.520 your chat app is hogging all the resources. While Discord 0:17:46.560 --> 0:17:49.199 aimed to avoid the issues gamers had with services like 0:17:49.240 --> 0:17:52.600 Skype and team Speak, it didn't always work. Out There 0:17:52.640 --> 0:17:56.840 have been times and Discords past when gamers have seen 0:17:56.960 --> 0:18:01.200 Discord get a little hungry for CPU and memory re sources. Now, 0:18:01.240 --> 0:18:05.000 to explain why this happens would require going into a 0:18:05.040 --> 0:18:07.639 lot of technical detail that I'm going to be honest, 0:18:08.080 --> 0:18:11.760 I don't fully understand. I'm not a programmer, so I 0:18:11.840 --> 0:18:14.040 have a bit of a grasp on it. But rather 0:18:14.080 --> 0:18:17.240 than stumble around hoping that I'm telling you the right thing, 0:18:17.720 --> 0:18:21.320 instead I'll say that depending upon the settings of a 0:18:21.400 --> 0:18:24.920 computer and on Discord and the specific build of Discord 0:18:24.960 --> 0:18:29.160 that you were using, sometimes users were fine, and sometimes 0:18:29.240 --> 0:18:34.080 they saw Discord alone sapping of a CPUs output. The 0:18:34.119 --> 0:18:37.679 team also wanted Discord to be multi platform, so they 0:18:37.680 --> 0:18:42.240 wanted to work on PCs, max, mobile devices and in browsers, 0:18:42.320 --> 0:18:45.120 and it needed to run smoothly on all of those 0:18:45.119 --> 0:18:49.400 platforms and provide a reliable service. To get started, Citron 0:18:49.440 --> 0:18:54.040 secured funding from the ub nine plus incubator company and 0:18:54.119 --> 0:18:57.160 several others, including ten Sent, the Chinese company that owns 0:18:57.160 --> 0:19:01.119 a stake in several video game companies out there. The 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:04.000 team build out the product, prepping it for its public 0:19:04.040 --> 0:19:08.120 release in May, and in many ways it is very 0:19:08.200 --> 0:19:11.040 much like a web browser. In fact, you can access 0:19:11.080 --> 0:19:13.920 Discord over the web, or you can download it as 0:19:13.960 --> 0:19:17.080 a native app on a desktop device or mobile device, 0:19:17.480 --> 0:19:22.240 and the activities in one instance happened across all other instances. 0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:25.400 So if for some reason, you're running the Discord app 0:19:25.520 --> 0:19:28.320 on your laptop, Okay, so you've got your laptop going, 0:19:28.520 --> 0:19:31.600 you've got the actual Discord program running. Then you've got 0:19:31.640 --> 0:19:34.679 a second laptop and you use it to open up 0:19:34.680 --> 0:19:38.440 a browser and go to the web based Discord service. 0:19:38.960 --> 0:19:41.280 And then you also had your smartphone out and you 0:19:41.359 --> 0:19:44.959 activated the Discord app on your smartphone, and you all 0:19:45.000 --> 0:19:48.080 three and in all three instances, you navigate to the 0:19:48.119 --> 0:19:51.520 same server and the same channel. Typing something in on 0:19:51.640 --> 0:19:56.000 your laptop that's running the app would publish it to everything. 0:19:56.040 --> 0:19:57.440 You would see it on your phone, you would see 0:19:57.440 --> 0:20:00.560 it on the second laptop, and so on. Now that's 0:20:00.560 --> 0:20:03.439 assuming again that all three of these devices are logged 0:20:03.440 --> 0:20:06.320 into the same server and same channel, which brings us 0:20:06.320 --> 0:20:10.080 to how Discord organizes stuff. So Discord has a kind 0:20:10.080 --> 0:20:13.879 of hierarchy of organization, and at the top is the server. 0:20:14.480 --> 0:20:17.879 The server is kind of like the community base of operations. 0:20:18.320 --> 0:20:21.679 When you create a discord server. You're not actually designating 0:20:21.720 --> 0:20:24.960 a specific machine on your network to act like a 0:20:25.000 --> 0:20:30.080 web server. Instead, the server is the dedicated online gathering space. 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:32.880 I kind of think of it like a Facebook page 0:20:32.920 --> 0:20:35.800 in a way, if you are making a page on 0:20:35.800 --> 0:20:40.640 Facebook dedicated to something. Uh, it's sort of similar. Now, 0:20:40.640 --> 0:20:42.560 when you think about it another way, you can see 0:20:42.960 --> 0:20:47.000 why this naming convention makes sense. On the web, you've 0:20:47.040 --> 0:20:50.879 got clients and you've got servers. Now, the client is 0:20:51.200 --> 0:20:54.800 typically something like a browser. So let's say you are 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:58.120 on your computer and you're surfing the web. To use 0:20:58.119 --> 0:21:05.000 an incredibly outdated phrase, the browser you use, whether it's Chrome, Safari, Edge, Firefox, 0:21:05.119 --> 0:21:08.760 or something else, that is the client. So let's say 0:21:08.800 --> 0:21:11.359 you're using your browser to look up an article on 0:21:11.400 --> 0:21:15.399 Wikipedia about Big Trouble in Little China, which, as we 0:21:15.440 --> 0:21:18.280 all know, is the best movie that was ever made. 0:21:18.640 --> 0:21:22.280 You type the title into Wikipedia's search bar and you 0:21:22.359 --> 0:21:25.040 hit intern And when you do that, you've sent a 0:21:25.080 --> 0:21:28.439 command to your client to request that specific web page 0:21:28.880 --> 0:21:32.480 from the web server that's hosting Wikipedia. So the client 0:21:32.760 --> 0:21:36.159 relays your request, which goes out over the Internet. The 0:21:36.200 --> 0:21:39.880 request is encoded so that the message will eventually get 0:21:39.920 --> 0:21:44.280 to the correct destination, that destination being the web server. 0:21:44.880 --> 0:21:47.920 That request ultimately goes to that web server that processes 0:21:47.960 --> 0:21:53.160 it and then returns the Wikipedia page. So the server 0:21:53.240 --> 0:21:55.480 since the appropriate data back to the client, which is 0:21:55.480 --> 0:21:58.080 your browser, and that's where you can see it. So 0:21:58.119 --> 0:22:01.639 with Discord, the app on your phone or desktop or 0:22:01.720 --> 0:22:05.040 the tab in your browser is the client. It's how 0:22:05.119 --> 0:22:08.280 you are accessing the community you are interested in, and 0:22:08.359 --> 0:22:11.119 that is the server, and messages that you type in 0:22:11.160 --> 0:22:14.719 the client get posted to the server, which all clients 0:22:14.760 --> 0:22:17.840 connected to that server can see at least all clients 0:22:17.880 --> 0:22:21.359 connected to that server that have permissions to view the 0:22:21.400 --> 0:22:25.160 message within whatever channel they can see it. So within 0:22:25.200 --> 0:22:28.400 the server, as I mentioned, you have channels, and these 0:22:28.440 --> 0:22:31.760 can be text based or voice based. So you could 0:22:31.880 --> 0:22:35.160 create a server for your gaming friends, you know, kind 0:22:35.160 --> 0:22:37.919 of the way the service was originally conceived, and you 0:22:37.920 --> 0:22:42.120 can create specific voice channels for different games, because maybe 0:22:42.160 --> 0:22:44.520 you're a group of gaming friends is really into a 0:22:44.520 --> 0:22:47.040 lot of different games, and maybe that group has gotten 0:22:47.119 --> 0:22:50.359 pretty big and not everyone is playing the same games 0:22:50.400 --> 0:22:52.960 at the same time, So you can have different voice 0:22:53.040 --> 0:22:56.120 channels dedicated to the various games and have multiple conversations 0:22:56.160 --> 0:23:00.200 happening in separate channels, and you only hear the off 0:23:00.200 --> 0:23:03.800 that's relevant to whichever channel you are in. So there's 0:23:03.840 --> 0:23:08.000 a conversation. Let's say you're playing Rainbow six Siege and 0:23:08.119 --> 0:23:11.760 other people are playing League of Legends. Well, you're in 0:23:11.800 --> 0:23:14.480 the Rainbow six Siege room. You've chosen to go into 0:23:14.480 --> 0:23:17.720 that channel. You only hear the conversation that's going on 0:23:17.760 --> 0:23:20.639 in that channel. Meanwhile, over in the Legal Legends channel, 0:23:21.200 --> 0:23:24.640 people are arguing about which path they need to take 0:23:24.720 --> 0:23:28.359