Skylight, a startup taking over TikTok with a extra open various, is launching its cell app to the general public on Tuesday after simply 10 weeks of lively improvement. The app, which is backed by Mark Cuban and others, is now one of many to build on top of the AT Protocol — the identical expertise that underpins the social community Bluesky and a growing number of other apps.
Developed by co-founders Tori White (CEO) and Reed Hermeyer (CTO), Skylight presents a short-form video app expertise with many acquainted options, together with an in-app video editor; the power to remark, like, and share movies; arrange your individual person profile; and observe others.
As a result of it’s additionally constructed on the AT Protocol (or “ATProto” for brief), customers will instantly be tapped into Bluesky’s community of over 33.8 million users. Which means movies posted on Skylight will be seen and engaged with by customers on Bluesky and different ATProto-based apps, just like the extra photo-centric app Flashes, for instance.
The corporate is funded by a pre-seed spherical from Cuban, who mentioned earlier this yr that he wanted to fund a TikTok alternative built on the AT Protocol. Leslie Feinzaig’s Graham & Walker Venture Fund additionally invested.
White, who was a journey influencer and is now a self-taught software program developer dwelling in Seattle, says she and co-founder Hermeyer had been impressed to create Skylight once they first heard that TikTok was getting banned in the U.S.
In preparation for the ban, which is currently on pause, White had backed up her TikTok movies. However she nonetheless apprehensive about shedding entry to her group and feedback. She and Hermeyer had already been enjoying round with ATProto and noticed the potential.
“The very first thing that us about ATProto was that Bluesky was not failing,” Hermeyer informed TechCrunch at the ATmosphere Conference in Seattle in March. “We didn’t see the ‘fail whale,’” he mentioned, a reference to the graphic that appeared in Twitter’s early days when the app was always crashing. “That made us really feel comfy in regards to the underlying expertise.”
Hermeyer and White quickly realized this was a great time to construct a brand new social app on the protocol that might be “ban-proof.”
Tapping into her influencer background, White started documenting Skylight’s improvement on TikTok, which helped deliver publicity to the product and construct a following of probably customers.
“We began with distribution,” White defined. “I truly made a video earlier than we ever wrote a line of code for this … [so] everybody can observe our journey as we construct,” she informed TechCrunch on the convention. “We had been like, oh my gosh, we’re constructing this factor that we expect is so cool, however nobody cares but. So we’ve got to construct a approach to inform individuals about it in order that they would care, as a result of we all know individuals want it,” she mentioned.
Right now, White’s @buildwithtori TikTok profile has almost 50,000 followers, a lot of which was early testers.
Like Bluesky, Skylight helps video uploads of as much as three minutes in size, a recent increase from the one-minute-long movies supported beforehand. However White sees Skylight turning into greater than only a decentralized TikTok clone.
She hints that Skylight sooner or later will enable customers to customise their feed, together with by using new gestures past swiping and scrolling.
Different options within the works embody assist for sounds, duets, stitching, bookmarks, and playlists.
The app is in beta on the Google Play Retailer and is now obtainable publicly on Apple’s App Retailer after preliminary testing.
social networks,TikTok,skylight,atproto
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