Babelgum was a free-to-view Internet television platform supported by advertising. The project was set up in 2005 by Italian media and telecommunications entrepreneur Silvio Scaglia (one of the founders of Italian TelCo FASTWEB) and scientist Erik Lumer, with the aim of developing interactive software for distributing TV shows and other forms of video over the Internet. In December 2008 the company launched Babelgum Mobile, a new mobile application bringing "web-tailored video content" to smartphones such as the iPhone via 3G and Wi-Fi.