Startup Whipclip Launches TV-Sharing App with Comedy Central, ABC, CBS, Fox and Others
Whipclip has launched a free mobile app that lets users create and share 30-second video clips of TV shows and music videos — legally.
The startup has deals with networks including Comedy Central, which is promoting the app for the live broadcast of the roast of Justin Bieber on Monday, March 30. Using Whipclip, Bieber fans — or haters — can create customized clips of the #BieberRoast and immediately share them to to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Pinterest, as well as via email and mobile texts.
Whipclip also has partnerships with ABC, CBS, FOX, VH1, A+E Networks’ A&E and Lifetime, Bloomberg, OWN and TruTV, as well as music labels Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment. The app is available initially only for iOS devices, as a free download on Apple’s iTunes App Store.
While people have been posting video snippets of TV shows online and on social nets for years, Whipclip lets users clip high-quality segments directly from the networks themselves — it’s designed to drive tune-in for live programming. Networks, too, have distributed real-time (or near-real-time) video clips, using Twitter’s SnappyTV platform or other programs, but Whipclip gives control to users to pick their own favorite moments.
See More: Richard Rosenblatt, Ex-CEO of Demand Media, Joins Whipclip, Startup for Sharing ‘Legal TV Moments’
Walter Levitt, Comedy Central’s chief marketing officer, said working with Whipclip made perfect sense to promote the “Comedy Central Roast of Justin Bieber,” which taped earlier this month.
“We want to make this as shareable as possible,” he said. “We instinctively and intuitively knew that this was the content people want to share.” A video clip of Bieber getting pelted with eggs already has more than 20 million views — and the cabler hopes millions more views are shared from the live telecast.
Whipclip, based in Santa Monica, Calif., with offices in Tel Aviv, Israel, was founded last year by Richard Rosenblatt, former CEO of Demand Media, and Ori Birnbaum, an entrepreneur and former venture capitalist.
“The days of awkwardly holding your phone up to the TV to record and share your favorite moments may be coming to an end,” Rosenblatt said. Besides being a better user experience, he said, Whipclip also gives content owners “with a viral, user-driven method to find new audiences.”
Shows covered under Whipclip’s partnerships include ABC’s “Castle,” “Dancing With the Stars” and “Once Upon a Time”; CBS’ “The Late Late Show With James Corden,” “NCIS: Los Angeles” and “The Talk”; Fox’s “Bob’s Burgers,” “Last Man on Earth” and “New Girl”; Comedy Central’s “Big Time in Hollywood, FL,” “Inside Amy Schumer” and “Workaholics”; TruTV’s “The Carbonaro Effect” and “Impractical Jokers”; Lifetime’s “Dance Moms”; A&E’s “Storage Wars”; OWN’s “Tyler Perry’s For Better or for Worse” and “Super Soul Sunday”; FYI’s “Married at First Sight”; and Bloomberg TV’s “With All Due Respect” and “Charlie Rose.”
Whipclip users can also clip and share thousands of music videos from the catalogs of Universal Music Group and Sony Music.
In addition, the app lets users search both live and previously aired TV programs to find quotes and specific moments, and users can watch the most-popular clips by following friends and celebrities in Whipclip.
Whipclip investors include Raine Ventures, Institutional Venture Partners, William Morris Endeavor, Ziffren Brittenham and Greycroft, along with media execs including Ari Emanuel, Peter Guber, Steve Bornstein, Scooter Braun, Gordon Crawford and Ron Zuckerman.
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