Jack Dorsey Revives Vine with New App diVine Amid AI Concerns

San Francisco, CA — A new project aims to resurrect Vine‘s iconic six-second looping videos, with the backing of Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey. On Thursday, diVine launched, offering access to over 100,000 archived Vine videos retrieved from a pre-shutdown backup, while allowing users to create profiles and share new content.

Unlike traditional social media platforms, where generative AI content often floods feeds, diVine will flag and block suspected AI-generated videos. This effort is supported by Dorsey’s nonprofit, “And Other Stuff,” established to fund innovative open-source projects that can reshape social media.

The creative force behind diVine is Evan Henshaw-Plath, an early Twitter employee known as Rabble. He highlighted the nostalgia and appeal of authentic user-generated content in an era where many platforms are overrun with AI creations. “We want to recapture the essence of a time when you had control over your social media experience,” he told TechCrunch.

Henshaw-Plath and his team spent months developing scripts to extract old Vine content, reconstructing videos and user profiles from large binary files saved by a community archiving group. Although the app includes a substantial number of popular Vine clips, it lacks a complete collection, missing content from niche communities.

Copyright for the original content remains with the creators. They have the option to request the removal of their videos through a manual DMCA takedown process. After reclaiming their accounts, former users can post new videos or upload previously unlisted content.

To ensure originality in video uploads, diVine uses technology from the Guardian Project, enhancing the trustworthiness of the content. Dorsey emphasized the importance of using permissionless protocols, like Nostr, which support the development of applications without corporate interests. “This approach empowers creative engineers to explore new possibilities in social media,” he said.

As TikTok and Instagram dominate the short-video landscape, diVine represents a potential shift towards a more human-centric platform, aiming to foster real user engagement rather than algorithm-driven interaction. Henshaw-Plath believes there is a significant demand for such a service, particularly among users seeking a break from AI-generated content.

DiVine is now available for download on iOS and Android.