We first met Detroit-based startup Rapt.fm (http://www.rapt.fm) back in November 2012, when we were swinging through town for the TechCrunch Northern Meetups. It's safe to say that Erik Torenberg (http://www.linkedin.com/pub/erik-torenberg/27/642/708) was the first startup CEO I'd ever met whose demo included a freestyle rap (http://techcrunch.com/2012/11/29/meet-rapt-fm-the-startup-that-lets-rappers-show-their-skills-with-freestyle-battles-on-the-web/). And the product, though then still in an early private alpha version, was very cool as well — a website that lets people all over the world engage in live rap battles in front of an online audience.
Since then, a lot of growth has happened over at Rapt.fm, and yesterday evening the startup finally opened up to launch (http://rapgenius.com/Rapt-fm-site-the-launch-lyrics) in public beta. This means that anyone, anywhere, at any time, can head over to the site and view or engage in competitive lyrical wordplay. This is no small feat for a bootstrapped startup — enabling live video, music, and an audience that can respond in real time takes some technical chops.
Torenberg (aka T-berg) has been on his grind (http://rapgenius.com/Wiz-khalifa-youngin-on-his-grind-lyrics) visiting San Francisco and Silicon Valley this week, so he stopped by TechCrunch's San Francisco HQ to talk about the beta launch.
He gave TechCrunch TV a look at the latest version of the Rapt.fm, engaged in a live rap battle with Rapt.fm developer Jarrett Abello (aka Johnny Gigantic), and also talked about the future of the company and its revenue plans — and how, much like RapGenius (http://techcrunch.com/2013/03/02/marc-andreessen-and-ben-horowitz-decode-groupon-ceo-andrew-masons-farewell-memo-on-rapgenius/), the platform's vision can go well beyond rap. Check it all out in the video below.
(http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/Techcrunch?d=2mJPEYqXBVI) (http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/Techcrunch?d=7Q72WNTAKBA) (http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/Techcrunch?d=yIl2AUoC8zA) (http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/Techcrunch?i=40uytBKh4Wk:ZQ0FugP1hJ0:-BTjWOF_DHI) (http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/Techcrunch?i=40uytBKh4Wk:ZQ0FugP1hJ0:D7DqB2pKExk) (http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/Techcrunch?d=qj6IDK7rITs) (http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Techcrunch/~4/40uytBKh4Wk)
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