Athletes ranging from middle schoolers to professionals now have a mobile app platform solely dedicated to showing off their most exciting highlights.
The Hanover-based Fivestar mobile app is similar to YouTube, but solely for athletes and their fans. The app is focused on users uploading videos of their highlights, not collections from aggregated sports broadcasts. The product launched on Tuesday with a 10,000-person user base and a 15-person staff.
Fivestar includes both more traditional, highlight-driven sports like lacrosse and basketball, as well as more obscure athletics like wakeboarding and e-sports. The application is currently focused on the 13-25-year-old market.
Of the company's 10,000 users, 70% are athletes and 30% are sports fans, according to CEO Erin McNeally. The application uses a freemium model. Free users see ads while premium subscribers can pay $5 a month or $55 annually to have ad-free viewing and other features.
The company, founded in 2021, has received some venture capital support and is currently pursing more funding.
When they first sign up for the app, fans select what sports they are interested in and can then rate highlights on a five-star scale. Fivestar uses those highlight ratings to give athletes an aggregate overall score. McNeally hopes that her company can be an alternative to the more centralized rating systems that exist for most sports by giving audiences the opportunity to vote for their favorite athletes.
Unlike most social media or video hosting platforms platforms, Fivestar has no comments section. McNeally said the company learned in focus groups that many users were hesitant to upload highlights because they were concerned about negative comments.
“We really wanted to create a fun, safe, positive environment for our users,” McNeally said.
Although the comments section on platforms like YouTube can often be a toxic place, they also help drive user engagement. McNeally is pursing alternative ways to provide an enjoyable customer experience. She plans to adds a feature where users can earn coins for certain activities, and then trade them in for prizes such as tickets to an event.
The company has signed several pro athletes to serve as brand ambassadors, including lacrosse stars Kyle Harrison from Baltimore, Trevor Baptiste from New Jersey, and Kylie Ohlmiller from New York. Other athletes include skateboarders Ryan Decenzo and Deon Harris; and former Women’s National Basketball Association pro and Baltimore native Angel McCoughtry.
