vChatter raises seed round for video chat without the gross stuff

September 2, 2010 | Anthony Ha
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vchatter random chatvChatter, a video chat startup led by online dating pioneer Will Bunker, has raised $250,000 in seed funding.

The service is similar in some ways to Chatroulette, a popular site where you can randomly chat with other users. However, Chatroulette has become notorious for the frequent apperance of on-camera masturbation (something the service is trying to fix in its latest update).

vChatter says it avoids that problem by checking screenshots of the chats to make sure they’re family-friendly. It’s a Facebook app, and any obscene behavior will be tied to your Facebook identity.

The Menlo Park, Calif. startup was cofounded by Bunker (who previously cofounded dating site One-and-Only.com, which became part of Match.com when it was purchased by Ticketmaster), Hitesh Parashar, and Dan Owen. They launched the app in May, and the company says it now has 1.7 million users, who have made 15 million calls.

The funding comes from family and friends, as well as Bunker and Owen.

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About the Author,

Anthony is a senior editor at VentureBeat, as well as its reporter on media, advertising, and social networks. Before joining the site in 2008, Anthony worked at the Hollister Free Lance, where he won awards from the California Newspaper Publishers Association for breaking news coverage and writing. He attended Stanford University and now lives in San Francisco. Reach him at anthony@venturebeat.com. (All story pitches should also be sent to tips@venturebeat.com) You can also follow Anthony on Twitter.

  • George Zaluski

    It'd be great if video chat sites came up with clever solutions to keep undesired exhibitionists out. I hope that this one that vChatter uses proves itself efficient and other sites will integrate it too. On a side note, there are some video chat sites such as DormRoom and MatchVenue that require a .edu e-mail address upon registration, and I think that is also a pretty good way to filter out the penis-attention-whores Chatroulette gave birth to. But unfortunately this .edu strategy only works for sites dedicated to students, so the search for a genitalia-free chat environment goes on.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Waqas-Ahmed/100001215200491 Waqas Ahmed

    vchatter

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