Facebook has today released a Instagram Video, a new feature that allows users to create fifteen second videos. There are 13 filters that can be applied to the video before publishing it. This move is targeted at Vine which last year was acquired by Twitter.
Vine allows users something similar and has become very popular for Twitter users. Instagram for video has some very good features in-built like video steady-cam that allows videos to look better even when taken from a mobile phone.
When Instagram was bought by Facebook, they first hit back with removing Twitter cards on Instagram. This stopped users from seeing a preview of Instagram images shared on Twitter. Twitter hit back by having their own image filters built into their mobile apps. The a popular service called Vine which allowed 6 second video uploads was acquired by Twitter and its growth has been exponential even though it was initially only on the iOS platform.
Overall, I still find these videos are too much style over substance. But considering its popularity, it would be interesting to see if Google has similar plans with YouTube.
Try out Instagram Video by updating the app on your phone. Or you can download them from the links below. Do drop in your comment.