On Thursday, Vine lovers round the world were gobsmacked to hear that Twitter is shutting down Vine, its short-video service that complements the popular social media platform. Vine, well-known for its six-second limit on looping videos, was created back in 2013, and has since launched many users to Vine fame as well as a slew of hilarious Vine memes. In the wake up the unexpected discontinuation, many users are wondering if you can save Vines before the site goes down for good. The company took to Medium to share a post explaining the extent of the shut down, and assured users that yes, you will be able to save your Vines — but it is still unclear as to how long other people's Vines will be viewable to you.
"We value you, your Vines, and are going to do this the right way," said the company in the open letter. "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."
As for when the site will stop allowing users to post Vines, as of right now their only answer is "in the coming months". It is still unclear as to when Vine will be discontinued, but Bustle has reached out to Twitter for clarification regarding the shut down.
Until the shut down, though, and after it takes place, users will be able to see their own Vines in their accounts, where they will be able to download them via desktop or mobile to save the file. Where they go after that is up to the user — more than likely many people will reformat for YouTube. The important thing to note, though, is that at this time it does not appear as though Vine has any intention of deleting work that already exists on the site, even if users will not be able to upload any further Vines after a specific date, whenever that date should come.
Bustle has reached out to Twitter for more information on why they are shutting down Vine, and Twitter has confirmed that there is no further information beyond what is in their post on Medium at this time.
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