Real-time communication platform
Spotrum
Rooms, live interaction and multiple communication modes — in one platform.
- Web application
- Mobile (in development)
- Users & profiles
- Rooms & membership
- Chat & files
- Subscriptions
- Moderation
- Presence & room state
- Voice & video routing
- Events & synchronisation
- Administration
- Monitoring
- Deployment
Overview
Spotrum is a communication platform built around rooms — spaces where people gather to talk, listen, broadcast and exchange messages and files in real time.
It is a COUBUS product: we use it to develop and test our approach to real-time, multi-user systems — product architecture, user experience, moderation, subscriptions and operations — in a live environment of our own.
01 — Product concept
Rooms as the primary unit
Everything happens inside a room. A room has an owner, participants, a communication mode, a chat and shared files. Rooms can be public and discoverable, or private and invitation-only.
Communication modes
A room operates in one of several modes — from a single broadcaster to a moderated set of speakers to an open conversation between all participants. The mode defines who can be heard and how, and it can change as the conversation evolves.
Live and persistent at the same time
Voice and video are live; chat, files and membership persist. Participants who join later still see the context — messages, files and who is in the room.
Roles and control
Owners and moderators manage participation, speaking rights and content. Subscription tiers extend limits such as room capacity and broadcast duration.
02 — Key decisions
What we chose, and why.
Product and engineering decisions at concept level — the reasoning that shapes the product, without implementation detail.
- 01
One room model for every mode
Broadcast, moderated conversation and open conference share a single room structure. Switching modes changes rules, not the space — so the product stays simple as modes are added.
- 02
Media routed, not relayed
Audio and video pass through a dedicated media layer instead of being sent between every participant. This is what makes larger rooms possible without degrading the experience.
- 03
A single source of room state
Membership, speakers, mode and chat are synchronised from one authoritative state, so every participant sees the same room — including after reconnects.
- 04
Moderation designed in
Speaking rights, participant control and content management are part of the room model from the start, not added on top.
- 05
Web first, mobile next
The web application is the reference experience; mobile applications follow the same room model and are in development.
03 — Platforms
- WebAvailable
- AndroidIn development
- iOSIn development