Twitter Launches Mini-Video Service Called Vine

Twitter’s new video sharing service called Vine, that allows users to shoot and share six seconds long and set to loop automatically (similar to an animated GIF).

Avalibility

For now, it is an app available only for the iPhone and iPod Touch (Twitter is working to bring the service to other platforms).

The app is simple: users aim their cameras at what they want to capture, tap the screen once to start filming and tap it once more to stop.

The user can press their thumb to the screen to record, and then release to switch to a new angle, perspective, or shot. The maximum length of a video is six seconds, but that could comprise seven or eight very short clips.

The real-time nature of it fits in well with the Twitter brand, as Vines let you look through a window into someone’s real life, complete with motion and sound.

Aside from the Twitter connection, which could really help Vine gain users fast, what makes it unique is that you have to hold your finger on your smartphone’s screen to keep recording. If you take your finger off the screen, the video will pause, then resume recording when you place your finger back on it. This enables simple, seamless cuts within the video. Users can share videos on Vine itself, on Facebook and Twitter and as simple links. You don’t need a Twitter account to sign up.