Twitter, Inc. TWTR recently launched its video streaming app, Periscope. Twitter had acquired Periscope in January this year for about $100 million according to media reports. The move came just after a similar social media app, Meerkat, unveiled its latest $12 million funding round.
Periscope was formed last year for enabling the easy sharing of live video broadcasts through a smartphone. The app enables video sharing in a hassle-free manner using just a button to notify followers. Users can stream their videos which can be saved and appreciated by Twitter followers just with a tap on screen.
This feature ensures that the video is not entirely lost and can be replayed at a future date. The acquisition by Twitter will not only give Periscope a huge user base but also a wealth of other resources to improve its offerings going forward, while Twitter will benefit from the Periscope’s sophisticated features.
The Meerkatting Buzz
Meerkat, launched last month at the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival in Austin, TX, is a similar live streaming app that allows users to stream live video to Twitter followers. Within a month after its launch, ‘Meerkatting’ has become highly popular due to its ease of use and functionality.
The push button feature of Meerkat allowed Twitter users to share their videos in real time with their followers. This made the app an instant favorite.
Meerkat was designed to bank on Twitter networks. The live streaming notification is sent to the follower list from Twitter. This makes it dependent on Twitter as users can only use the app if they are on Twitter. In fact, until recently, Meerkat, used the social graph information from Twitter to connect its own users with the Twitter followers and send notifications regarding any live streaming.
Threat to Twitter?
Meerkat has a first-mover advantage, which helped it move ahead. Per a report from mobile app market analytics firm, App Annie, the app has been installed more than 50,000 times over a short period of 30 days. Moreover, the app has been featured on the iTunes homepage more than 46 times so far and is consistently moving up on the top apps list in iStore. In fact, Google trends suggest that it has already achieved as many as 500 media mentions in the last 30 days.
A couple of weeks ago, Twitter had limited the access of its social graph function for Meerkat. The restriction is a significant hurdle for the app as it will prevent notifications about a live video-stream from being automatically sent to Twitter followers. Meerkat users will have to add people manually for the notification to be sent.
Periscope vs. Meerkat
Though both the apps are quite similar in their functionalities, each has its own strengths and weaknesses. Some key features that give Periscope an edge over Meerkat are the options for saving videos, a cleaner chat function, the option to line up a shot prior to streaming, etc.
Also, both the apps have seen some glitches after launch. Meerkat has already solved the issue regarding video hijacks but the concerns regarding security of content remain. On the other hand, Periscope users have faced problems regarding the overload of notifications from followers and streaming recommendations.
However, given Meerkat’s first-mover advantage and Periscope’s polished features coupled with Twitter resources, we have to wait and see which one prevails.
Twitter currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Better-ranked stocks in the sector include ClickSoftware Technologies Ltd. CKSW, DTS Inc. DTSI and j2 Global, Inc. JCOM. All three sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy).
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