Key Takeaways
- Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey revives Vine as “Divine” through his nonprofit
- Platform offers 150,000-200,000 archived Vine videos and new upload capabilities
- Built on open-source Nostr protocol to prevent corporate control
- Focuses on human-made content with AI detection to block synthetic media
Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey has brought the iconic 6-second video platform Vine back to life under the new name “Divine.” The revival includes access to a massive archive of original Vine content and allows users to upload new videos, positioning itself as an antidote to AI-generated content flooding other platforms.
Dorsey’s nonprofit “and Other Stuff” funded the project, which aims to recreate the nostalgic Vine experience while embracing open-source principles. Divine differentiates itself by actively blocking AI-generated content and focusing on authentic human creativity.
How Divine Resurrected the Vine Archive
After Vine’s 2016 shutdown, the Archive Team preserved a large collection of videos, though the files were difficult to access. Early Twitter employee Evan Henshaw-Plath (known as Rabble) led the technical effort to reconstruct Vine’s content from these preserved binary files.
“Can we do something that’s kind of nostalgic? Can we do something that takes us back, lets us see those old things, and also an era of social media where you could control your algorithms or just follow who you want, knowing a real person recorded the video?” Henshaw-Plath told TechCrunch.
After months of work, Divine now hosts approximately 150,000 to 200,000 archived Vine videos from about 60,000 creators, representing a significant portion of the platform’s most popular content.
Claiming Your Vintage Vine Account
Original creators can reclaim their old Vine accounts through the Divine app, request content removal via DMCA, or upload new videos. The platform uses verification technology from the Guardian Project to ensure uploads are human-made, automatically flagging and blocking suspected AI-generated content.
Rabble believes Divine addresses growing demand for genuine online experiences. “Companies see the AI engagement and think people want it, but we also want agency over our lives and social experiences,” he explained.
Open-Source Foundation
Divine is built on Nostr, an open-source protocol championed by Dorsey that prevents any single entity from controlling the network. This allows developers to create their own applications and run independent servers.
“Nostr—the underlying open source protocol—empowers developers to create a new generation of apps without VC-backing, toxic business models, or huge engineering teams,” Dorsey told TechCrunch.
How to Access Divine
Divine is available for download on iOS and Android devices at Divine.video. Users can also access content and sign in through the desktop website.
