Airtime was launched in June of 2012 to much fanfare, as was to be expected with any startup being launched by famous entrepreneurs Sean Parker and Shawn Fanning. The major difference between Airtime and Chatroulette is that Airtime is a Facebook App, and thus requires users to have Facebook accounts and be logged in. Furthermore, by requiring users to be logged in Facebook, Airtime is able to allow people to randomly meet based on interests, as well as make it much less likely for people to do inappropriate things (since their actual name is tied to what they do). This was an attempt to both solve the problems associated with Chatroulette while at the same time expand the capabilities of it in order to make the entire user experience better. Sadly, it didn’t seem to work out.

Airtime’s launch was immediately followed by a continuous decline in App usage. There could be a lot of reasons for this, such as the inability to remain anonymous, or simply the fact that what they’ve done isn’t really new. Either way, many people have noticed this trend, including the folks at VentureBeat. Nonetheless, I would still recommend giving it a try sometime, as it is a very well made application as should be expected after all the money that was poured into its development. You can check it out by visiting www.airtime.com.