Meerkat is a hot cat at SXSW; we talk to CEO Ben Rubin
AUSTIN — Meerkat's Ben Rubin is surprised by all the attention.
The 27-year-old CEO behind the livestream-over-Twitter app known as Meerkat — the most buzz-worthy app so far at SXSW.
Meerkat launched only a couple of weeks earlier, and "we decided at the last minute just to come here and meet and greet and say 'hi' to everyone. Some magic happened, we can't explain it."
Actually, it appears rather easy to explain. "The mission of the app is to get live video to travel in the speed of tweets," Rubin told me in an interview that we broadcast live over Twitter using the Meerkat app.
We only had about 50 followers, but it was also Saturday morning and we hadn't given our Twitter followers much notice — less than 15 minutes. The heads-up feature is also part of the app.
Rubin mentioned some of the early ways people are exploiting Meerkat. A New York real estate agent used the app to show off newly available properties to prospective buyers. Worshipers livestreamed a church service. Famed skateboarder Tony Hawk took people with him to a playground.
A few members of the news media employed Meerkat to stream video to their Twitter followers during the recent Apple Watch news media event.
Meerkat would seem to have broad potential in education, marketing (product launches) and at various entertainment venues, from concerts to sporting events to conferences such as SXSW. Left unsaid are the possibilities in the adult-oriented communities.
You can also only wonder what the lawyers and rights police might have to say about an app that can keep the stream going indefinitely at public or private events.
Rubin says he has attracted interest among investors but "we're not talking about money at the moment. It's more about getting this from a side project to a solid project."
He's well on his way, though there are some limitations to Meerkat in this first version. And the experience isn't entirely bug-free. For example, a few people apparently dropped the connection to my streamed interview with Rubin.
But setup is a breeze. After downloading the app on your iPhone — Meerkat, which is free, is iOS-only for now though an Android version is in the works — you enter your Twitter credentials and are ready to go.
From then on, you tap the "Stream" button in the app to instantly start broadcasting a live video feed to your followers. You can also tap "Schedule" to broadcast at a later designated time. You can add a description to let your Twitter followers know what's coming. Once a stream is underway, your followers can tweet at you and provide instant feedback. You'll also be able to see how many people are watching.
Your Twitter followers must catch the live stream in real time, however, since there are no broadcast reruns. Fortunately, what you do shoot lands in the Camera Roll on your phone. From there of course you can edit it and share it to Twitter, YouTube or on other social networks.
"You basically have a tool to take your audience with you," Rubin says. "The audience will be able to walk around with Ed throughout South-by and feel more connected. You will read their questions, answer them, they'll feel not just that they're just consuming the content (but) that they're participating in it."
While currently focused on Twitter, Rubin hasn't ruled out a future presence on Facebook, Google Plus or other social avenues.
Twitter itself has taken notice, not always to Meerkat's benefit. Rubin says he didn't talk to Twitter about a potential sale, but Twitter did buy a Meerkat competitor called Periscope.
"Twitter is a great company, they have their own agenda and obviously they're smart if they're buying live video streaming companies," Rubin says. "Periscope will probably be a very good product because Twitter bought them."
Twitter also cut off Meerkat access to the Twitter "social graph." The move means that new users on Meerkat won't get the push notifications that would have made it easier for them to find your live stream.
Rubin doesn't appear discouraged. "Everyone still can just tweet and go live. What has been (made harder) and only for a short period of time until we fix it, is that new users might not get push notifications through the app. We have such a close and dense community right now it doesn't matter."