Back in early June, we were still talking about Vine’s incredible success, and saw its new Android release rocketing up the Google Play charts, cruising right past Instagram. But it wouldn’t be long before Facebook and Instagram had their revenge, and a week ago yesterday we learned that Instagram was going to try beating Vine at its own game, adding some video support of its own. We’ve since seen Vine attempt to stay relevant with a new update, but today we get a look at some usage stats that make Vine look like it’s in serious trouble.
Running checks for Twitter links to Vine and Instagram through Topsy’s analysis shows a huge Vine drop-off right when the Instagram announcement came out. Simultaneously, Instagram saw a gentle upswing in popularity, and while it’s still trending a little above average, Vine shows no strong signs of recovery.
We also thought to check how Vine’s doing in Google Play. Back on June 11 it was the number four free app in the US. Currently, it’s down at number twenty-two.
One thing’s curious to us, however: why didn’t Instagram’s modest rise in popularity mirror Vine’s precipitous decline? Is it that once Instagram got involved, people lost interest in these sort of short, socially-shared clips? Are they just not cool anymore? Is the novelty gone?