AAA Napster pair snag $8.3m from Google syndicate

Napster pair snag $8.3m from Google syndicate

Airtime, the live social media website launched by Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker, two of the founders of famous file sharing website Napster, made its latest website update on Thursday. The company, which has raised $8.3m in series A funding from investors including Google Ventures, is still running in stealth mode but is allowing early applications from prospective users.

Joining Google Ventures in the round were venture capital firms Founders Fund (which counts Parker among its partners), Andreessen Horowitz and Accel Partners, microfund SV Angel, and angel investors including TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington, actor Ashton Kutcher, musician will.i.am., Digital Sky Technologies founder Yuri Milner, Ron Conway and Michael Parekh.

According to comments made by Parker and Fanning to news sources including TechCrunch and Forbes, the site will be looking to build on the kind of random live video chat component pioneered by another website, ChatRoulette, and will be ostensibly about bringing strangers together to chat over webcams.

As for positions within Airtime, Fanning is the company’s chief executive officer and Parker its executive chairman, while Joey Liaw is chief technology officer.

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