Twitter’s Vine debuted in late-January exclusively on Apple’s iPhone so you could easily spam the web with a few seconds worth of “viral” clips. While we knew it would eventually land on Android, its somewhat slow adoption had prompted Twitter to go back to the drawing board and add more features.
Less then five months later, Vine for Android is a reality. And reminding us that Vine still exists, Twitter has proudly announced that the iPhone edition now has thirteen million users – hardly what you’d call a successful iPhone app.
Perhaps a bit unsurprisingly, many features from the iOS app are currently missing in the initial Android release. On the other hand, the Android version happens to include a feature Twitter says isn’t possible on the iPhone…
Twitter in a blog post confirms that the two versions are not perfectly in sync.
Vine 1.0 for Android supports only the basic functionality: capturing/sharing 6-second clips, the Explore tab, sharing to Twitter and the Find Friends feature.
iOS features not found in the initial Vine for Android release: front-facing camera support, search, mentions and hashtags and sharing to Facebook.
Here’s Vine for Android.
Interestingly enough, Vine for Android sports a feature that’s unique to Android: zoom.
More worryingly, Twitter says future updates will bring more features “that could exist only on Android.”
Of course, there’s nothing wrong with that – Android by the virtue of Google’s proclaimed openness does allow programmers to implement capabilities that are not possible on iOS devices, unless you’re jailbroken.
We notably heard the same argument concerning Facebook’s Home app. According to the prominent iOS hacker Pod2go, Apple could relax restrictions by releasing a custom firmware for developers version that doesn’t require signed code.
You can grab Vine for Android right from Google’s Play store. The app requires Android 4.0 or higher. The latest version of Vine for the iPhone and iPod touch can be downloaded free from Apple’s App Store App Store.