Play is definitely more akin to django than lift is. Lift, as I've read not experienced, has specific philosophy for how to build web apps that is slightly different than django or play.
I'm a long time django user. I love django. I've used it in production apps. I like to try out new languages as a hobby and so I got myself the programming in scala and the Play framework in action (manning). Just trying out Play however I can't seem to get this feeling that I could do it more easily and faster in django, though that may be because I'm comfortable with django and python. There are also a ton of django apps that I can leverage to build out parts of my app. I'm not sure about the play ecosystem in that respect.
I'm also specifically looking for advantages that the language itself can bring but since I haven't gotten very far I haven't discovered any yet but I'm hopeful that I will be pleasantly surprised.
I'm a long time django user. I love django. I've used it in production apps. I like to try out new languages as a hobby and so I got myself the programming in scala and the Play framework in action (manning). Just trying out Play however I can't seem to get this feeling that I could do it more easily and faster in django, though that may be because I'm comfortable with django and python. There are also a ton of django apps that I can leverage to build out parts of my app. I'm not sure about the play ecosystem in that respect.
I'm also specifically looking for advantages that the language itself can bring but since I haven't gotten very far I haven't discovered any yet but I'm hopeful that I will be pleasantly surprised.
Having said all that I just saw some play love coming from LinkedIn: http://engineering.linkedin.com/play/play-framework-linkedin