Twitter Kills Vine

Twitter announced on Thursday that they will be discontinuing the mobile app Vine, where users could create and share six-second looping videos. Vine was officially launched in January of 2013 after being acquired by Twitter in October 2012.

In a statement published to blogging site Medium, Twitter said that Vine will be shutting down "in the coming months" and assured users that they will be able to download and save their Vines, and that the app's website will remain online so that Vines will be viewable.

Since 2013, millions of people have turned to Vine to laugh at loops and see creativity unfold. Today, we are sharing the news that in the coming months we’ll be discontinuing the mobile app.

Nothing is happening to the apps, website or your Vines today. We value you, your Vines, and are going to do this the right way. You’ll be able to access and download your Vines. We’ll be keeping the website online because we think it’s important to still be able to watch all the incredible Vines that have been made. You will be notified before we make any changes to the app or website.

Thank you. Thank you. To all the creators out there — thank you for taking a chance on this app back in the day. To the many team members over the years who made this what it was — thank you for your contributions. And of course, thank you to all of those who came to watch and laugh every day.

What’s next? We’ll be working closely with creators to make sure your questions are answered and will work hard to do this the right way. We’ll be sharing more details on this blog and our Twitter account, and will notify you through the app when we start to change things.

- Team Vine & Twitter

Vine was notable for the sheer amount of "stars" who rose from obscurity via their posts on the app to carve out careers. Many journalists also used Vine to create short, sharable clips of various news stories.