Community App Starter · Industry version
Creator Community Template
Your audience in your building — tiered access, member spaces, and live sessions in code you own.
Every platform between you and your audience takes a cut and keeps the relationship. This starter generates a creator community you own outright — tiered member spaces, threads around your work, live session hubs — so the place your fans gather is an asset you hold, not a profile you rent.
- 6 core entities
- Moderation built in
- Code you own
- Vibe + Governed modes
01 · The problem
Why a generic Community falls short
A creator community is an economy, not just a forum. Access maps to support level — free followers in the lobby, paying members in the workshop, top-tier patrons in the inner room — and generic forum software has no native idea of tiers, so creators end up duct-taping payment links to permission groups and manually promoting members who upgrade.
The gravity is also different: conversation orbits the creator's output. A new video, chapter, or track drops and the community's week reorganizes around it. Generic platforms treat every thread as equal weight, burying the drop under whatever was posted last — exactly backwards for a space that exists because of the work.
And renting the room means the landlord owns the guest list. On hosted community products the member relationships, the engagement data, and the export options all sit behind someone else's terms — a precarious place to keep the most defensible asset a creator has.
02 · Data model
The data model, adapted
Everything in the base Community starter —
forumstopicsrepliesvotesmoderation_flagsprofiles— plus the entities this industry actually runs on:
| table | what it holds |
|---|---|
tiers | Support levels mapped to access — which forums, perks, and sessions each level unlocks. |
live_sessions | Scheduled AMAs, watch-alongs, and workshops, each with its RSVP list and companion thread. |
03 · Screens
Modules through the industry lens
Tier-gated forums
01Every forum declares its minimum tier, and access follows membership status automatically — upgrades unlock rooms instantly, lapses close them gracefully. The velvet rope is enforced by the schema, not by a moderator with a spreadsheet.
Drop-centered discussion
02New work gets a featured thread that anchors the space — pinned, prominent, and gathering reactions in one place instead of five fragmented posts. Older drops settle into a browsable archive that doubles as a portfolio with a comment section.
Live session hubs
03Each AMA or workshop gets an RSVP list, a pre-question thread, and a home for the replay and afterglow conversation. The events that make members feel close to the work stop living in ephemeral chat announcements.
04 · In practice
Workflows it models
Release day
01The drop publishes to its tier: top patrons get the early room for forty-eight hours, then it opens wider. The featured thread collects first reactions, and you reply from the middle of your own community instead of five comment sections.
Monthly AMA cycle
02Announce the session, collect questions in the pre-thread all month, go live, then post the replay into the same hub. Members who missed it arrive to a complete artifact — question, answer, conversation — not a dead link.
Tier upgrade moment
03A free member hits the workshop-room door, sees what's inside, and upgrades. Access flips at the moment of payment, the welcome thread greets them, and the conversion is a row in your database you can actually study.
Creator Community template — frequently asked questions
Can I gate content and spaces by membership tier?
Yes — tiers are a core entity mapped to forum access, session invites, and perks. Gating follows membership status automatically, including the graceful downgrade when a payment lapses.
How does this pair with my payment setup?
The platform is code you own, so your payment provider webhooks update membership status in your own tables. No middleman takes a percentage of your members' support for hosting a forum.
What happens to my community if I switch tools elsewhere?
Nothing — that's the point. The community runs on your infrastructure with members, threads, and history in your database. Changing an email tool or payment provider swaps an integration, not the ground your community stands on.
Is this the same as a membership site?
They're siblings: this starter is the gathering place — forums, sessions, member interaction — while the membership starter centers gated content publishing and plan management. Many creators run one, then grow the other from the same owned data.
Related
Dual7 App Starters
Build your Creator Community on your terms
Your audience in your building — tiered access, member spaces, and live sessions in code you own. Describe your version to start — the output is a project you own.