Did Twitter's CEO just tease the company's own video hosting?
In a tweet this morning, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo included a video clip from Vine, a startup the company reportedly bought last fall. Is this a sign of Twitter's own video service?
Twitter's CEO may have teased the company's own hosted video service in a tweet this morning.
As Twitter has aimed to take more control over the services its users rely on, it has consolidated access to photo-sharing, restricted third-party clients, and clamped down on developers. It has also made acquisitions aimed at bolstering its own offerings. Among them have been those that have led to Twitter's official search tool, its purchase of TweetDeck, and others.
One recent acquisition, according to AllthingsD, was Vine, a video clip service that never launched.
Today, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo posted a tweet (see below) with an embedded video published on Vine's service, and it appears this could be the first sign of Twitter offering its own hosted video service.
Steak tartare in six seconds. vine.co/v/bOIqn6rLeIDvia @dhof
— dick costolo (@dickc) January 23, 2013
A visit to Vine's Web site says that the service -- "The best way to see and share life in motion. Create beautiful looping videos in a fun way, then share with your friends and family" -- is coming soon. And Costolo's tweet may well be the first evidence that "soon" really does mean soon.
Twitter declined to comment for this story.
Although Twitter users long had access to a wide variety of third-party tools for things like photo hosting, and even using Twitter itself, the company has been increasingly limiting users' choice in such tools because it wants more control over advertising revenue that they generate. It's not known if the company will eventually limit the choices users have for embedding videos.