Most Interesting Digital Advances: Airtime: New Facebook Video Chat Site

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10 Most Interesting Digital Advances: Part 4

With a large percentage of teenagers and young adults using Facebook as well as video chat, the two have been combined for an innovative program called Airtime. Sean Parker, one of the masterminds and co-founders of Facebook and co-creator of revolutionary music sharing site Napster, (whose character was played by Justin Timberlake in The Social Network)is responsible for the creation of Airtime. According to a recent study conducted by Pew Research Center's Internet and American Life Project, 37% of teenagers use online video chat. The new video chat program for Facebook comes with a variety of celebrity backing, including Snoop Dogg, Alicia Keys, and Jim Carey.

What is Airtime?

Airtime is a new video chat system that its users can access entirely through their Facebook account. It requires no downloading or special system logon, other than logging into Facebook itself. Users of Airtime can have live video chat with their friends directly in their Facebook browser. Aside from chatting with friends, Airtime users can also meet new people based on shared interests, as well as watch videos together virtually. Anyone with a webcam on their computer and a Facebook account can utilize the video chat system by Airtime. Airtime has launched with $33.5 million in funding and has additional financial funding from Google Ventures, Accel Partners, Kleiner Perkins Caulfield, Byers, Andreessen Horowitz, and Social + Capital. Additional celebrity investors include Will.i.am, Ashton Kutcher, and Scooter Braun (Justin Bieber's manager).

Features of Airtime

There are a few unique features of Airtime, which include the ability to:

· Find new friends on Airtime by being matched with other Airtime users that have the same interests or other things in common, such as living nearby or having mutual friends on Facebook. Once you enter a chat, you can immediately see the other person's interests that are similar to yours, as they are highlighted in green. These double as conversation starters when having a video chat with someone new.

· Give applause to the other person in a chat conversation by clicking a button on the center of the screen. The applause adds points to the person's meter which when filled up, gives them an Applause Badge.

· Airtime also plans to integrate the ability to have multiple video chats in different tabs on an internet browser, hold group chat, and synchronize music listening. Additional future features in the pipeline include listening to music live, integrating photo viewing, as well as playing games and other fun things with your friends through Airtime.

Extra measures have been taken to ensure the safety and security of conversations. One of the worries of potential users is the concern that other people may be able to view their video chat; however Airtime provides assurance that a "direct call" is a completely private video conversation not monitored or seen by anyone else. A "matched call" is one where the user is matched with someone of similar interests, and therefore has screenshots taken periodically to be sure nothing inappropriate is occurring.

There have been concerns about the use of Airtime as a place for cyber-sex, but Airtime says it has a zero tolerance policy towards behavior that is inappropriate, as detailed in their Terms of Use. Individuals under the age of 18 are only matched with other people under 18, and the same goes for adults over the age of 18. Both the captured screenshots of the "matched call" and age restriction terms are evidence of Airtime's policy towards inappropriate behavior, including pornography. Airtime is compared to ChatRoulette, which matches strangers throughout the world for webcam conversations. ChatRoulette quickly became a target for users interested in pornography and nudity. Airtime wants to steer clear of this direction, and hopes to do so with the added monitoring and safety measures.

Additionally, because users will log into Airtime through their Facebook account with a person's real profile attached, there is less anonymity. With ChatRoulette, users could remain anonymous, which added to its pornographic use and exhibitionism. With Airtime, users won't be anonymous. One violation, such as unwanted nudity, and the user will be banned. Airtime also has a built-in video chat flag feature, where users can flag and report abuse or inappropriate behavior. Human reviewers will also monitor screen shots of video chats between strangers and computers will help to also identify abuse.

Airtime's Implication to Marketers and Advertisers

Capitalizing on the sheer number of users, marketers and advertisers can purchase video ads to market their product and services. In addition to premium paid accounts, video ads are a way that Airtime plans to bring in revenue. Similar to Spotify and Pandora, the Airtime service will occasionally interrupt a video chat session with a video advertisement. While the video ads won't be implemented right away, they're on the horizon. Full-screen video ads are planned at a high cost-per-thousand. Full-screen videos being viewed in the middle of a video chat conversation could be a huge benefit for advertisers looking for dedicated eyeballs to view their products and services.

Airtime's Competitors

Regardless of the various video chat systems provided by other sites, Airtime continues to be the only one with compatibility and matching capabilities, setting them apart from the rest. Some of their current competitors include Microsoft's Skype, Apple's Facetime, and Google+ Hangouts. Additional video chat startups looking to integrate social media include ooVoo, TinyChat and Ustream. SocialCam, another Airtime competitor, also uses Facebook and currently has 70 million users.

Although Skype's calling minutes increased by 40 percent during the first quarter of 2012 compared to the same period a year earlier, Parker believes Skype is "archaic technology". It also lacks the social media aspect that Airtime does. Yet, Skype has seen great success in work situations, long-distance relationships, and communication with faraway relatives.

Regardless of its competition, Airtime is bringing video chat to a whole new level with their matching and compatibility features, along with the planned group features, as well as the convenience and scale of Facebook.

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