Divine App Launches, Offering Six-Second Looping Videos as a Successor to Vine

A new app called Divine, designed as a spiritual successor to the popular short-form video service Vine, has been released to the public. Similar to Vine, Divine allows users to create and share six-second videos that loop continuously. The platform also hosts over two million classic Vine videos.

Divine's founder, Evan Henshaw-Plath, a former Twitter employee, stated his intention to create the app as a "reset" for social media. He expressed a desire for the platform to rival existing apps, suggesting a departure from what he sees as a current misdirection in social media. A key feature of Divine is its prohibition of AI-generated content, a stance Henshaw-Plath explained as a response to his fatigue with content where the authenticity is uncertain.

"I want to be able to have fun and not have to second guess these things," Henshaw-Plath said in an interview prior to the public launch. He aims to provide an environment where users can enjoy content without questioning its origin.

Vine, at its peak, commanded over 200 million monthly active users and was instrumental in launching the careers of prominent internet personalities such as Jake Paul and Lele Pons before its shutdown by Twitter in 2017.

The development of Divine is supported by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, who held a significant role at the company when it acquired Vine in 2012. The app's infrastructure is built upon Nostr, a decentralized system. This architectural choice means Divine is not under the control of a single corporate entity, unlike platforms such as TikTok or Instagram. The decentralized nature of Nostr potentially allows users to migrate their accounts and content to other compatible services, avoiding platform lock-in. This approach is also being utilized by social media platforms like X rivals Bluesky and Mastodon.