Pierre Omidyar

Ginx is the name of the mysterious service.  A regulatory filing allowed Dan Primack to discover the existence of both it and its parent company, Peer News, and Primack writes, "According to the filing, Peer News has raised around $2 million."

As for the people involved, Pierre Omidyar is eBay’s founder, and Randy Ching’s spent years as an exec in the same organization.  A third fellow, Mike Mohr, is on Peer News’s board, and also acts as a senior advisor to the philanthropic investment firm Omidyar Network.

So there’s a rock-solid background.  In regards to Ginx’s daily operations, the service is tied to Twitter, and comes in both mobile and desktop flavors.  Little else is known, but after rumors started circulating, a short official statement at least announced, "Ginx is a Twitter client that aims to provide Twitter users with a rich experience for sharing and discussing links.  Ginx was created to enable people to become more actively engaged in the news and topics they care about."

Invite codes and alpha users are now getting lined up, so stay tuned for more info.