Periscope closes after core features were rolled into Twitter

Editor’s take: Periscope, the service that helped popularize the concept of live video streaming from a mobile device in the mid-2010s, has been discontinued. Of course, if you’re familiar with Twitter’s history as it relates to acquisitions, than you probably aren’t too surprised by this development.

Periscope, along with Meerkat, burst onto the scene in early 2015. Shortly before its public debut, Twitter purchased Periscope for an amount rumored to be between $50 million and $100 million. The app soared in popularity over the following years but eventually, most of the app’s capabilities were rolled into Twitter.

In December 2020, we learned that Periscope usage had been declining and that the app was stuck in an “unsustainable maintenance-mode state.” As such, the decision to shut down Periscope was communicated to the public at that time.

The Android and iOS apps closed on March 31, 2021. The Periscope website will live on (at least, for now) as a repository of public broadcasts. Interested parties can also request a copy of their Periscope data and download their broadcasts through Twitter by visiting the settings menu.

Twitter essentially did the same thing a couple of years earlier with Vine, acquiring the startup before its official release, building it up before eventually shutting it down.

Masthead courtesy Mr. Whiskey