Sean Parker resurrects failed video chat service
Napster co-founder Sean Parker is embodying the maxim that if at first you don’t succeed then try, try again by attempting to resurrect Airtime – a video chat service which flopped on launch four years ago.
In bringing the service back from the dead Parker will stick with the same name but rebuild an accompanying app from the ground up to allow people to listen to music and watch videos together remotely.
This allows users to create and join ‘rooms’ based on particular topics or groups of people which will facilitate conversations, link sharing and video streaming for friends who find themselves in the same room as each other.
Parker has signed up partners including Vevo, Vimeo and Spotify for his re-launched venture which will this time be focussed on existing friends rather than throwing complete strangers into the mix.
Explaining why he’d chosen this moment to have a second stab at it Parker said: “The reason why this has taken us so long is not because we didn’t know what we were doing. We weren’t flailing. The technology was incredibly difficult to execute.”
The original Airtime was launched in 2012 with celebrity backers including Snoop Dogg, Jim Carrey and Martha Stewart.