Digital comic and game platform DLsite’s parent company Eisys recently launched its new social media platform Pommu,dubbed the “secret hideout for otaku” and heavily marketed towards anime, manga and video game artists and fans alike. Debuting on November 5, the “demo version” of the platform ran for less than a week before being suddenly suspended for maintenance. On November 10, Pommu’s official X account announced that the social media service will be halted for an indefinite period of time due to numerous bugs and malfunctions being discovered.
Only two days after the platform’s launch, Pommu’s management team reported that traffic from new users and visitors was greater than anticipated, causing it to slow down, especially late in the night. They also expressed concern about the website possibly becoming even heavier during the weekend, asking users to report if they experience any difficulties accessing the platform.
Unfortunately, it seems like the website was barely able to survive the weekend, because on Sunday morning (November 9), the team behind Pommu announced that the platform will be entering maintenance, with the resumption date scheduled for “ after Monday, until we determine a clear course of action for how to the problem.” On Monday, November 10, the Pommu official account followed up with an update, stating that they are currently working on bug fixes as well as revisions of the management and maintenance team. It is still unclear when services will be resumed, but the management team asks users to be patient, as the website repairs might take a while to finish.
While it hasn’t been disclosed what kind of issues the Pommu management is currently dealing with, users speculate that the malfunctions came as a result of an overwhelming influx of spam and troll accounts, specifically from overseas. Taking into consideration that the website was slowing down especially late in the night (JST), it wouldn’t be surprising that there is some truth to this theory, though it is best to wait for follow-up announcements. Luckily, as explained in a recent X post, it seems like the team is taking it slow and approaching the maintenance period with a positive attitude. In the meantime, they advise users to check out DLChannel, a forum-styled community network centered around the content hosted on DLsite.
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At least the team had the foresight to realize that heavy traffic would happen during the weekend. Hopefully it could go back up during the week or before December starts.