A True Horror Story ??...

One of the most memorable Halloween’s I have ever experienced was back when I was working at Twitter. I was hosting the green room backstage at ComicCon with the UK’s top Viners. Sounds fun? Sure! If Twitter hadn’t JUST dropped the news that very morning that they were killing off Vine! The HORROR! ??♀?

So, there I was, surrounded by zombies, cobwebbing, and a group of confused, angry and disappointed creators. This talented crew had just lost their main platform for brand revenue - so, what were they going to do? Walk out on me, right? Wrong - fortunately, I had built up a strong enough relationship with the Viners in my role as Creator Manager at Twitter, that regardless of all the confusion and anger, they all agreed to stick by me (and each other) and continue to create and post great content all weekend for ComicCon.

We'd be here forever discussing the lessons from back then, and the many changes in creator relations, but as I try to focus on my passion, community building, I thought I would get back in touch with a few of the top Viners from those days to share their thoughts on why the UK Community was such a strong force and what we can take away today.

Ben Charman : My brother Joe Charman and I were literally the only people in our whole town making vine videos, so whenever you would meet another Viner in the UK, you instantly had something in common. We would share ideas, tips and advice, it felt like a secret club. After the app closed, I used the skills I had taught myself to run my own animation production company and now I make short form videos for brands, promoting and selling my artwork through social media.

Huw Samuel : The UK Vine community felt like family. Even the followers' reactions, it felt like a club that everyone was welcome to join in. However, the top creators dominated the explore pages, and the algorithm made it extremely hard for new faces to break through and it looks like Tiktok is doing great work here for creators. Vine opened the doors for what I am doing today, writing, producing and acting in films. The Vine days were some of the best times of my life, and I’m very proud to have met some amazing friends throughout it that I’m still close with today.

Jeff Cyrus : As a USA Viner, the UK experience was really warm and welcoming. Overall, the creators I worked with were more focused on building friendship than a following. Making content was such a dream in the UK, we all got together and only posted what made us laugh rather than worrying about what did well. In the short time I spent with my creator friends in the UK, we developed a lifelong brotherhood, we bonded over our differences and embraced our similarities

Building creator communities is more complex today; increased platforms and saturation, higher expectations, strong Web3 players and advanced technology, however, listening to the words of Ben, Huw and Jeff, the foundations of strong communities are still built on the human connections, let's never forget that.

Family / Friendship / Fun / Sharing / Club / Laughter / Bonding / Advice / Passion?

It's clear Vine set the stage for TikTok, and here are a few of my favourite's creating even better content today on TikTok:

Follow: Jcyrus // Mannon Matthews // Olaf Falafel // Aaron Crascall // Liza Koshy