It’s official! As of June 21st, Twitter announced that you’ll now be able to tweet videos that are 140 seconds long. Say goodbye to the 30-second time slot of yesteryear: you can now show off to the world your ability to eat 140 marshmallows, in 140 seconds.
The news comes as Twitter announced earlier this year that they have relaxed their previous 140-character limits on worded tweets, which means that creative add-ins such as GIFs, photos, and videos no longer contribute to the character limit. The announcement also comes as Twitter declares that video tweets have increased by 50% since the beginning of 2016.
With heavy competition from the likes of YouTube, Facebook, and Snapchat – who all offer users the ability to share videos easily through their servers – it seems about time that Twitter caught up, allowing customers to send video tweets that squeeze in more than the odd word or two. This change in regulation is also set to reach Vine, a subsidiary of Twitter. Vine’s unique selling point is its 6-second video time, which content creators use as a platform to direct followers to ‘full videos’ on many Google-owned YouTube channels. Well, long gone are the days of one business benefiting another: Twitter intends to allow content creators the chance to upload their full videos straight onto Vine, assuming, of course, they’re no longer than – you guessed it – 140 seconds.
Further announcements come from the Twitter HQ too. The social media giant has launched a new app called Engage, which is targeted at content creators. The app, which launched on June 21st, offers real-time data and insights for its users and gives content creators the chance to track analytics easily on tweeted videos. On top of this, Engage also gives creators the ability to filter through their Twitter mentions, allowing for content creators to understand their audience better.
These announcements come as Twitter attempts to keep up with the current trend of video creation on mobile phones, something many people are now turning to as platforms such as Snapchat and Instagram become ever more popular.
