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PopTok Premieres As New Medium To Inject Memorable Hollywood Clips Into Everyday Conversations

Posted on: Monday, 30 June 2008, 09:02 CDT

PopTok (www.poptok.com), a new online medium encouraging people to express themselves in everyday conversation using the most popular clips from movies, television and music, premieres in private beta today. The application launches with a vast array of "Toks," which are short snippets of favorite licensed Hollywood clips, from a wide range of content partners, customized by the PopTok team for instant message (IM) and email conversations.

"People are constantly quoting lines they hear in popular movies, TV shows, and music," said Illi Edry, PopTok founder. "With PopTok, people can now express themselves like never before but in a way that's already familiar to them."

"I am thrilled to be joining PopTok on the eve of the private beta launch," said Scott Kauffman, president and CEO of PopTok. "PopTok lives at the intersection of popular culture and personal expression. It will forever change the way we communicate online."

From new releases to classic favorites, PopTok presents the entertainment industry with additional opportunities to repurpose and promote their creative content. PopTok has approved content from many of the major studios, networks and labels including:

-- CBS -- Universal Pictures -- Lionsgate -- Warner Brothers -- Paramount Pictures -- Warner Music -- SonyBMG

"PopTok expands on our ongoing strategy to re-productize our content," states Derek Broes, SVP Business Development, Paramount Digital Entertainment. "PopTok enables us to provide a very entertaining way of communicating in an ever growing online social world."

Scott Kauffman joins PopTok as President and CEO, coming most recently from Yahoo!, which in late 2007 acquired BlueLithium, where he served as President and COO. Scott has an extensive background in executive management with digital entertainment, consumer marketing, media and technology companies, including CompuServe and Time Warner.

Scott was Vice President and General Manager of online services for CompuServe, and a presenting member on the road show for one of the Internet industry's first initial public offerings, led by Goldman Sachs. At CompuServe, he assumed operational responsibility for all of the company's online brands, including CompuServe's pioneering CIS service, and SpryNet, CompuServe's ISP offering.

As a member of the founding team of Entertainment Weekly, he served as Vice President of Marketing, Promotion and New Media where he was responsible for the New York digital media studio.

PopTok boosts existing forms of communication using technology built from scratch that works seamlessly with most existing IM and email programs, including AOL Instant Messenger (AIM), Yahoo Messenger and Windows Live Messenger. Once installed, just drag and drop a video clip directly into your IM and email conversations. PopTok is currently in private beta for a limited number of users. Those interested in joining the private beta can submit their information online at www.PopTok.com.

PopTok launches with seed funding from Israeli-based, Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP), a media-focused VC firm headed by founder Erel Margalit and New York-based, GTI Group, headed by former President and CEO of Sony America and Sony Media and Entertainment, Mickey Schulhof.

ABOUT POPTOK

PopTok (www.poptok.com) is a media company that enables everyone to express themselves in everyday conversation using a new video-based language consisting of memorable clips from movies, television, and music. PopTok has established partnerships with the following content providers: CBS, Fox, Lionsgate, Paramount Pictures, SonyBMG, Universal Pictures, Warner Brothers, and Warner Music. PopTok is a private company, headquartered in New York, and backed by Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP) and GTI Group.

ABOUT JERUSALEM VENTURE PARTNERS (JVP)

Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP) is a leading Israeli venture capital fund with a unique international network, focusing on building technology-based market leaders in the areas of media technologies and enterprise software, semiconductors and innovative materials and communications and networking.

ABOUT GTI GROUP (GTI)

GTI Group works with corporate partners, management teams and entrepreneurs to build world-class companies. GTI invests in venture capital, growth equity and lower middle market leveraged buyout opportunities. GTI helps create businesses that can achieve defensible positions and scale in large and attractive markets. Areas of investment include online media and telecom, aviation, IT and software, industrial technologies and services, clean technology, energy and energy services.

Source: Business Wire

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