This article is more than 1 year old

So long Vine, your six seconds of internet fame are over

Twitter takes axe to mobile app

A day after announcing it was cutting 9 per cent of its staff, Twitter has added more woes to its workers by announcing it will be closing the Vine mobile app.

Twitter bought Vine back in 2012, shortly before it officially launched, and it caught on, gaining at least 200 million users and making some users internet famous. The six-second video loops were a good fit for Twitter, but now the troubled company has said the mobile app will be pulled in the next few months.

"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," Twitter said in a blog post.

"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."

While Vine was popular, the service did cause some problems for Twitter. For a start, the company had real difficulty monetizing the service to generate revenues and so did its users.

The other issue was that Vine had a lot of competition that users preferred. Instagram was already out and got a massive injection of funds when Facebook bought it, and it added the ability to post video shortly after Vine was bought by Twitter. There were other competitors, such as Vigi and Lightt.

While some of those have since fallen by the wayside, others haven't and Vine – while popular – wasn't growing at the rate Twitter would have liked. With Thursday's announcement, the user base is expected to flee the service and move to the competition. ®

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