This project started as a pretext.
A pretext to explore Claude Code — Anthropic's AI development tool — on a real project with real constraints. A few days later, I had a working MVP. A few weeks later, a full platform in production — with real communities, events, and users.
The problem
I've been running community events for years. And for years, I've hit the same wall.
There's no tool that does community + events + free + good UX + audience ownership all at once.
Meetup
Good community model, but dated UX and organizer paywall.
Luma
Clean experience, beautiful event pages. But every event is an island — no retention.
DIY tools
Google Forms + Eventbrite + WhatsApp + spreadsheets. You get by, but you lose your audience.
The answer
The Playground starts from a simple idea.
- The community is the core entity — not the event.
- The event is a viral entry point.
- Joining an event automatically makes you a community member.
- The community persists between events.
Meetup's community model + Luma's experience + 100% free. No subscription, no platform commission.
Persistent communities
Members, roles, invite links
Shareable events
Standalone pages, drafts, calendar sync
Automated notifications
Confirmations, reminders, updates
Built-in ticketing
Stripe payments, 0% platform fee
Comments
Discussion thread on every event
Waitlist
Auto-promotion on cancellation
Explore
Public community directory
AI Radar
Similar event detection via Claude
About me
I'm Dragos Dreptate. Executive, entrepreneur and coach — 25 years in tech, based in Paris. I founded The Spark, a consulting firm specializing in AI, Product and Innovation.
For years, I've been running events — product conferences, masterclasses, internal events and agile community meetups. That experience as an organizer, running into the same broken tools over and over, is what sparked The Playground.
A question, an idea, want to connect? Find me on LinkedIn.
The stack
Entirely built with Claude Code (Anthropic). Hexagonal architecture, strict TypeScript, everything deployed in Europe.
Next.js 16
App Router, SSR/ISR
TypeScript
Strict, full-stack
PostgreSQL
Neon serverless (EU)
Prisma
ORM + migrations
Auth.js v5
Magic link + OAuth
Tailwind + shadcn
Design system
Stripe Connect
Secure payments
Resend
Transactional emails
Sentry
Error monitoring
Vercel
Edge deployment (EU)
PostHog
Product analytics
Claude Code
AI-powered dev
Anthropic SDK
Embedded AI (Radar)
By the numbers
2 100+
commits
450+
pull requests
81
use cases
1 170+
tests
The code
Curious about how it's built? The source code is on GitHub.
DragosDreptate / the-playground
github.com/DragosDreptate/the-playground