Today’s featured Elevator Pitch comes from Toksta, a browser-based instant message/chat client that can be integrated into most websites with only a few snippets of code. The service supports text, voice, and video (Flash is required for the latter two), and is free. The site generates revenue by placing ads in the browser-based chat windows, and allows site owners to participate in a revenue sharing agreement (you can also pay for a premium, ad-free whitelabel version).
The site is up against a few other services (like meebo’s recently launched Community IM), but its voice and video offerings may help set it apart. You can try the chat out for yourself on MyHappyPlanet, where you’ll need to register an account first. In practice it seems to work pretty well, though the ads (which can include audio) can be a bit jarring.
Oh yeah, according to the pitch the first 10 people to sign up will apparently get a free puppy, sent “via mail” (I sincerely hope that he is joking). If you’d like a puppy though, you can get one for free here (you won’t regret it).
It seems promising, but they are probably a bit too late in the game.
If they were the first mover in this space, they would have done very well.
They definitely are interesting.
As Instant Communications communications go, I don’t think they are too late in the game. Meebo is a great company but it has locked/branded itself up as an IM integrator.
Before Meebo got into the game, companies like Userplane and Ebuddy were Gorillas already. However, going ad-based revenue model might pose a problem as bandwidth is gonna be a problem if they get moolah soon.
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Zee Tchermenns !
Nice looking site, interesting idea, and a post on TechCrunch. I would say they are heading in the right direction. Good luck!
Remember, a dog is for life, not just for Christmas… but I guess a virtual puppy is okay.
From what I understand the users of my community can chat with their friends through meebo.com if I integrate the meebo community IM. And they even have to have a meebo-account to chat with their contacts from other IM networks. From my point of view these are too many reasons why my users would rather log in at meebo.com instead of my community so toska seems to provide a better alternative here
what about userplane?
@r2d2: totally agree..2008 was all about being “open” and maybe some very large players like facebook can afford this (even though fb also makes very sure that they are not too open and always keep a competitive advantage), but 2009 is the year of the CRISIS and you have to GET REAL and stop hugging your competition and all that BS…
so I’d rather add a feature that keeps my users on MY site than adding one that does the exact opposite.
IM integration is a flawed business model.
There, you are probably right. I don’t think even meebo will survive unless they are bought out.
Unfortunately, too many web 2.0 “companies” are not companies at all. Many of them are not even products. Instead they are just product features.
And creating a product feature is not really a viable business strategy for 99.99% of companies.
FYI – Toksta was a Seedcamp 2008 Winner.
http://www.seedcamp.com
Did “Arnold” do the voice over for that video?
No, Arnold is not part of Zee Tchermenns, he’s part of Zee Austriens.
I’ll take that as a compliment..
OK, let’s say I hear the elevator pitch, it sounds cool, and I go to the internet to find out more about them…..what do I type in? Talkster.com? Talksta? Taksta? Toksta? Takster? Tokster?
Why can’t these companies get a decent name before they work on their elevator pitch?
totally agree with R2D2 – meebo makes it way too difficult to be useful.
great product, i like it. all the best to toksta.