The line of investors trying to press their way into Turntable.fm‘s latest round of funding was appropriately similar to the line outside a crankin’ dance club: a mix of money and celebrity. And not everybody could get in. But the funding finally closed, and it came in at $7 million, half a million less than the amount “confirmed” by Business Insider in July. Turntable had offers on the table for twice as much money, but they really wanted Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures to lead the round. Wilson will take a board seat.
The other investors include the original investors in Turntable’s predecessor company, Stickybits: First Round Capital, Polaris Venture Partners, and Chris Sacca’s Lowercase Capital. Some celebrities and entertainment executives also got into the round, such as Lady Gaga’s manager Troy Carter, Madonna’s manager Guy Oseary, Jimmy Fallon, band members from the Roots, former MySpace Music president Courtney Holt, and former Facebook exec Tim Kendall. I also heard that a second venture capital fund, perhaps Benchmark or Kleiner, put in a nominal amount just to get an option to invest in the next round.
Turntable is a social music site that launched in private beta last May. I stumbled upon Chris Sacca’s avatar DJing there late one night just before the last Disrupt in New York City. You need to know someone through Facebook to get in. But once you are in you can listen to others players spin some tunes while your avatar bobs its head, or take a turn at the turntables yourself to earn points from the other listeners in the same room. More than 300,000 rooms have been created so far, and the site has grown to 650,000 registered users, with about a third of those active.
All told, Turntable is already streaming more than one million songs a day, which is why both Hollywood and Silicon Valley are paying attention and pulling out their check books.
Turntable.fm is a project of Seth Goldstein and Billy Chasen, the two guys who brought us Stickybits. Users in each dance room has an avatar and can chat with each other. Users can create their own playlist and get up in the DJ booth to battle it out. Turntable.fm a social music platform that encourages hanging out with people and discovering music. If a DJ is playing a song you like, you can add it to your playlist, buy...
Fred Wilson is a founder and Managing Partner of Union Square Ventures. Fred began his career in venture capital in 1987 and he has focused exclusively on information technology investments for the past 16 years. From 1987 to 1996, Fred was first an Associate and then a General Partner at Euclid Partners, an early stage venture capital firm located in New York City. In 1996, Fred co-founded Flatiron Partners. Fred was the Managing Partner of Flatiron Partners and was responsible...
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