R.I.P Q Of WorldStarHipHop

Q From WorldStarHipHop.com Interview ‘RIP’

Lee “Q” O’Denat started WorldStarHipHop.com in August 2005 as a distributor of mixtapes. Shortly after the website’s beginning, hackers destroyed the website. O’Denat later restarted it as a content aggregator.

Thereon, WorldStarr focused on hip hop beefs, in addition to softcore pornographic video models, which were previously popular through “street DVDs” such as Smack, Cocaine City, The Come Up and other raunchier counterparts. O’Denat used the setup of OnSmash.com, a website which had already been distributing that sort of material. O’Denat said that this led to tension between the two websites. He added “Once we went 100 percent video, showing that original hood stuff, we prevailed.”

The site, operated by Worldstar, LLC, was founded at age 33 by Lee “Q” O‘Denat, a Hollis, Queens-based hip-hop fan and Grover Cleveland High School dropout. Described by Vibe as a “remnant of the Geocities generation,” the site regularly features public fighting caught on video, music videos and assorted content targeted to young audiences. O’Denat refers to the site as the “CNN of the ghetto.” In 2012, Alexa Internet stated “Compared with all Internet users, its users are disproportionately young people and they tend to be childless, moderately educated men 18–21 who browse from school and work.”