Vine video-sharing app is back – and battling AI slop

As a pioneer of the short-form video format, Vine has been credited as one of the most influential – if short-lived – social media platforms.

The app, which allowed users to record a looping six seconds of video, boomed in popularity after its launch in 2013, creating a plethora of viral comedy sketches and internet memes. It hit 100 million monthly active users at its peak and helped launch the careers of influencers like Logan Paul.

It was snapped up by Twitter (now called X) soon after its creation, but closed in 2017 after the platform failed to make the sums add up.

However, Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s co-founder, is now backing an attempt to bring back a revamped version of the much-loved platform. It also has a new philosophy – to be the short-form video app offering “freedom from AI slop”.

Dorsey, also a former Twitter chief executive, has funded the new platform, which will host 500,000 videos from the original Vine app and also let users post new content.

Any new material has to meet the traditional six-second time limit and must also be made by a human. Under a new name, “Divine”, the platform has relaunched in app stores, with a philosophy stating: “Creative power belongs in human hands”.

It comes as low-quality AI-generated material is becoming increasingly hard to avoid online. Recent research found that more than 20% of the videos that YouTube’s algorithm shows to new users are “AI slop”.

Divine was initially launched to testers last November, hosting 100,000 popular videos from the original app. However, it is now open to the public. The project has been spearheaded by Evan Henshaw-Plath, known online as Rabble, a former Twitter employee who wanted to give old vines a permanent home. Hesaid there has already been interest from some original Vine creators in the project.

While the return of the app will generate nostalgia among a large cohort of web users, those behind its return have bigger aims. “Divine began as a personal project to reconnect with a time when the internet felt creative, open, and unquestionably human,” said Henshaw-Plath.