Vine co-founder plans sequel to video app

Vine 2.0 is coming soon, co-founder of retired app says. Photo / Getty Images

One of the co-founders of six-second video app Vine, which was closed down by Twitter in 2017, has announced that he's working on a successor to the app.

Dom Hofmann, who co-founded Vine in 2012, announced on Twitter that he's developing a new app named Byte which will focus on looping video clips, just as Vine did.

Hofmann said that Byte will be released in Spring 2019, but no other details of the app have been annouced so far.

Twitter acquired Vine before its launch in 2012, and the app became immensely popular due to the number of social media stars who used its six-second video format to create short comedy and music clips.

Logan Paul, who has become one of YouTube's biggest stars, started his career on Vine before switching to longer YouTube videos. Another Vine star, Cameron Dallas, was given his own Netflix series.

However, Twitter closed down Vine in 2017. The decision to close the service came as Vine struggled to retain its top stars. The app had also faced increasing competition from Facebook-owned Instagram, which also allows people to post brief video clips.

Twitter's decision to shut down Vine angered many fans of the app. Comedian Melanie Bracewell, who was a user on the app, tweeted "You can rip my 4 million vine loops out of my cold dead hands" after Twitter announced the closure of the service.

Vine co-founder Rus Yusupov publicly criticised the decision, tweeting "Don't sell your company!" after Twitter's announcement.

Hofmann is hoping that his upcoming app will tap into the same fanbase which Vine previously enjoyed.

Last year, Hofmann announced that he was working on v2, a spiritual successor to Vine. That project was abandoned in May, however, with Hofmann citing funding issues with the service.