The Vine social video network has finally gone. Twitter decided to shut it down. You can still see some of the old Vines, but it no longer exists as a functioning network. Over the years of its lifetime many people put a lot of effort into their communications via Vine. Its design and concept around ultra-short videos were ideal for giving viewers short bursts of fun and entertainment. Many companies found that with some thought and effort they could utilise the 6 second video format in a clever way to promote our businesses. With a little imagination, a 6 second video could be used to express a simple idea or tell a joke in a way that made our products appealing. My area of expertise has always been longer form video advertising but even I dabbled in Vine production. The video below was made for the Doritos brand.
Now that Vine has closed, the question that occurred to me was… What do people do with all those videos they made? My second question was can we still get some value from all of the effort we put into making those adverts? But firstly, let’s take a look at why Vine failed.
Why did Vine fail?
There were two main reasons why Vine failed and why Twitter, its owner, decided to shut it down. And those two reasons are Twitter and Facebook. Hold on, I hear you cry, why would Twitter shut down its own specialised video network? Well, Twitter now runs video itself without any need for a partner network. To ask users to upload videos separately, or pass from one network to the other was diluting the Twitter brand. What Twitter wanted was for people to use their lead network to get their communications – whether text, still images or video. The decision to close Vine was straightforward.
As Twitter’s ability to post longer video than the ultra short form appeared, it meant that users didn’t need to go anywhere else. If you want to make an ultra short form 6 second video you still can, and you can upload it directly to Twitter. Alternatively if you want something 30 seconds long you can upload that too.
Similarly Facebook’s inclusive use of video contributed to the redundancy of Vine. If you want to browse shortform videos just look at your Facebook newsfeed. They are everywhere. Videos ranging from 6 seconds right up to 10 and 20 minutes are all over your newsfeed. What’s interesting is that the legacy of Vine continues. You can see it when you look on Facebook or Twitter and see those videos that are only 5, 6 or 9 seconds long. We use the same kind of idea and format as Vine videos. Vine created this ultrashort form language, and that lives on – just on other social media platforms now. Which brings me rather neatly round to what do we do with our Vine videos.
What do we do with our old Vines?
I made some Vine videos. What will I do now they are mostly gone? I will look through my backup of video creation to find all of the old files. Everything I’ve ever made exist somewhere on those backup discs. Even to the raw footage. That means any work I completed including the video you’ve already seen that I made for Doritos is available. If you’ve ever had a video professionally made it will still be available too. I still have the original files which I can upload to new platforms. What I’ve done with this Vine file is upload it to YouTube. I’ve also put it on my Facebook business page. Why, you may ask, am I advertising Doritos? I’ll tell you. I’m not. What I am doing is displaying my previous work for potential new clients. I can’t direct them to the original Vine so I have to have that video somewhere else. So there it is on YouTube and Facebook displaying my ability to be creative with video. Your old Vine videos shouldn’t go to waste either. You need to retrieve them and put them back to work.
Getting extra value
The Facebook newsfeed is the ideal place for old Vines. They are just long enough to play as a viewer scrolls past. They could be just eye-catching enough to make them want to click your page to see what you are all about. I also think, in a stroke of irony, that uploading your old Vine videos directly to Twitter is a pretty good idea too. Your old Vines have already been paid for and lived a life once. Now you are re-using them and it’s almost like getting advertising for free. So don’t let those old Vine videos fade away. Dig out the files and put them back to work. They could turn out to be the best value advertising you didn’t pay for.
