“Billionaire” is a word that tends to ruffle feathers more than usual in the current political climate since He That Shall Not Be Named started nosing around in government matters.
But in the case of Shark Tank maven Mark Cuban, dare we say it-he just might be one of the good billionaires.
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Cuban has worked hard on several projects in the last few years. His most notable, Cost Plus Drugs, launched in January 2022 with the aim of cutting the middleman out of getting prescription drugs into the hands of consumers.Â
Cost Plus now offers several thousand options at highly affordable prices, so it’s safe to say Cuban has kept his word, not to mention that he has helped millions of people in desperate need.
Related: Elon Musk may have just extended an olive branch to Mark Cuban
Now, Cuban has turned his business nose towards a new company with an incredibly ambitious aim: offering real competition for Gen Z’s social media favorite, TikTok.
Mark Cuban carefully contemplating his next business move.
Jerod Harris/Getty Images for Vox Media
A company changing social media for the better
While TikTok continues to thrive with its 170 million active users, the company has bigger concerns than growth. ByteDance, the company’s owner, must sell the app’s US operations by April 5 or face a ban.
However, one company believes it can improve TikTok’s famous formula significantly. Skylight, a decentralized social media platform that launched on April 2, looks and acts a lot like TikTok, but it’s built on the AT Protocol, a system created by BlueSky.
Related: Mark Cuban has some blunt AI advice for entrepreneurs
That comes with a few huge bonuses, the biggest of which is that those new to the platform can instantly tap into BlueSky’s 33.8 million users (for instance, BlueSky users can see and comment on Skylight posts).Â
The accounts built on the app are also “ban-proof” because they aren’t locked to Skylight but are transferrable to other apps built on the AT Protocol (BlueSky, PinkSky, Spark, and Flashes are just a few).
Mark Cuban, who adopted BlueSky early on and is one of its most prominent users, funded a pre-seed round for Skylight. He is joined by Leslie Feinzaig’s Graham & Walker Venture Fund.
Cuban is known for funding promising businesses not only during his time on Shark Tank but also outside of it. No doubt, the billionaire finds Skylight’s premise appealing. He has been extremely vocal on X about its failings as a social media outlet, often in direct threads with owner Elon Musk.Â
