We give developers the opportunity to tell us journalists why we should sit up and pay attention to the sites and devices they are working on. Today it’s video sharing software Plumi.

1) Who are you and what’s it all about?
We’re an Australian based non-profit called EngageMedia. We run a video sharing website focused on social and environmental issues in the Asia-Pacific region. To run the site we developed Plumi, a free software video sharing platform based on the Plone content management system.

2) Why would this be useful to a journalist?
Plumi would be useful if you wanted to set up and run your own independent video sharing site with the above features and didn’t want to fork out thousands of dollars for a proprietary system. Plumi is completely free and open source and available to be modified and built upon.

3) Is this it, or is there more to come?
There’s a lot more to come. The platform is in constant development and we’re always looking for new programmers to contribute to Plumi or for projects to take it up to build new video sharing sites.

4) Why are you doing this?
Currently no major video sharing site shares the technology it’s built upon meaning users have to bow to often dubious terms and conditions. Coupled with this is the fact that these sites often make large sums of money they don’t share with their contributors. We believe an independent media requires independent and open source infrastructure that is available for anyone to use.

5) What does it cost to use it?
It’s completely free. You will however need a server to set it up on and a geek who knows how to do this.

6) How will you make it pay?
We receive our funding from philanthropic bodies and donations from users of the system. Reklama: Vadovų ir darbuotojų paieška, personalo atranka bei mokymai Primum Esse We supplement that income by rolling out video sharing sites for clients. Additionally as the system is open source it attracts a wide variety of contributors who add features and fixes voluntarily.