Step up and be the DJ with Turntable.fm

It's a digital party with all your friends or a group of complete strangers—and you're the DJ.

Turntable.fm is a myriad of chat rooms that have a specified genre—dubstep, hip-hop, country, and everything in between—and the five users that are currently onstage select what songs are played.

The interactive experience is fun, engaging, and colorful right from the get-go. You can sign in using your Facebook account or register independently. You can choose a DJ name or use the default, which is generally a collaboration of your first and last name, but can be changed periodically.

Right away, each user customizes an avatar that appears in whichever room you're sitting in on. Every avatar starts out with a basic set of options for customization. However, when you attain DJ Points, you can make your avatar stand out from the crowd.

Joining or creating a room and posting up in one of the five allotted DJ slots earns DJ Points. When your turn comes up in the queue, you can stream music files live from your own computer or choose from Turntable's vast music library. Now, this isn't just an online free-for-all DJing party. If you're picking tracks that the crowd isn't enjoying, you will be booted off of the stage.

A small, New York-based startup is responsible for establishing Turntable. According to the website, their mission is to move the digital music revolution from a solitary experience to a constantly evolving social one.

At any given time, listeners can give feedback and "lame" or "awesome" the current DJ. Too many lames and you'll be booted off. If you keep the crowd moving and rake in the awesomes, you get DJ Points to put toward upgrading your avatar.

Also, each room has room administrators that set rules for the more popular rooms. Rules help regulate the flow of DJs and make sure everyone gets a shot. For example, DJs aren't allowed to be idle for more than 15 minutes or they are escorted off the stage. Additionally, any active DJ can only be onstage for a maximum of three hours before they're politely asked to secede their spot to another user.

Turntable provides endless possibilities for discovering music. The Mashup.fm room often attracts users that are uploading their own mashup tracks. Mashup listeners can look forward to more traditional mashup tracks such as Jay-Z and Rhianna or more bizarre pairings like Lil Jon lyrics laid over the Inspector Gadget instrumental.

Developers at Turntable have integrated their website well into social media. When users hear a track they like, they can listen to it on Spotify, buy it on Amazon and iTunes, or add the song to their own Turntable queue and DJ it at a later time.

The network is a great way to jam out and discover new music, as well as potentially promote some music of your own from the safety of your computer desk.