If you’re nostalgic for yesteryears (okay, 2014) when Vine was a hugely popular app, we have good news for you. The co-founder has finally come through with his two-year promise to bring a successor to the short-form video app that he started. Byte is a 6-second looping video app that seeks to penetrate a market that is already crazy about TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram Stories. They are hoping to replicate the success of Vine and also attract content creators by giving them monetization options.
At its most basic, byte is indeed the rebirth of Vine. You can use the built-in camera to capture 6 second videos or upload the videos from your camera roll. The app description says it “celebrates life, community, and pure creativity”. There are already some former Vine creators on board and they’re hoping to get more, especially those who prefer shorter video formats compared to the one minute of TikTok.
dear friends,
today we’re bringing back 6-second looping videos and a new community for people who love them.
it’s called byte and it’s both familiar and new. we hope it’ll resonate with people who feel something’s been missing. https://t.co/g5qOIdM8qG
— byte (@byte_app) January 25, 2020
The app also has some standard features like a feed, an Explore page where humans handpicked what you’ll see, notifications, profiles, etc. What’s missing for now are some of the things that have made its competitors really popular like augmented reality filters, transition effects, ability to create remixes, etc. But it’s still on its initial launch so you can expect them to add even more things as they go along.
According to Tech Crunch, one of the things that Vine co-founder and now byte founder Dan Hoffman is doing to make the app stand out is to help creators get monetization out of the platform. They will soon launch a pilot program to offer revenue share to creators that will become popular on the app. Creators who are on TikTok and Snapchat have tried to bring their audience to YouTube for ad-sharing purposes but to have it within the platform you’re popular at would be better.
If you’d like to give byte a try, either for nostalgic purposes or you want to start creating your funny or creative 6-second video loops, you can download it from the Google Play Store for free. Let’s see if they will be able to capture some of TikTok’s market, especially after the U.S. government continues to be suspicious of the Chinese-owned video platform.
