Twitter Releases Video-Clipping Tool LiveCut. What Does It Mean for Sports-Video Pros? The social-media platform will also be shutting down SnappyTV at the end of the year By Brandon Costa, Director of Digital
Monday, July 22, 2019 - 1:09 pm
Print This Story
Story Highlights
Twitter grabbed the attention of many in the content-creation game last week with the announcement of its new live-video-editing and -distribution tool, LiveCut. The cloud-based web application allows quick editing and sharing of video highlights of a live stream occurring from one's own Twitter account.
It's a move that the social-media giant has been chatting about since acquiring a similar technology in SnappyTV back in 2014. It was in 2017, however, that Twitter actively spoke about shutting down Snappy and introducing its own replacement.
Last week, Twitter introduced LiveCut, a web-based application for editing of highlight clips from a live stream on the social platform.
Now that time has come. So, what does the move mean for sports-video content creators?
At first glance, users will find a video clipper very similar to that of SnappyTV but one baked seamlessly into a more comprehensive video ecosystem offered by Twitter, known as Media Studio. For that reason, Twitter Product Manager Kevin Cohen, who is overseeing LiveCut, recommends it not be considered simply a like-for-like replacement of SnappyTV.
I think LiveCut brings a lot more to the table in comparison to SnappyTV, he says. All of your broadcasts [in Media Studio] are going to be available to be clipped in LiveCut, which is very different from SnappyTV, where you needed to send a stream to Twitter and another stream to SnappyTV in order to clip from it. That was too much of a burden, especially for groups like [sports teams], who in their postgame press conferences needed to do two streams at once. We're bringing that functionality, and I think that's going to be really beneficial for partners.
The usability of LiveCut sticks to the roots of what made SnappyTV popular with digital and social-video content distributors: its no-frills UX was easy to learn (or teach), and it's free. Those factors became very obvious to the design team as they worked through user research with partners who were heavy users of SnappyTV. Sure, Twitter could have loaded LiveCut up with a world of new features, but much of the user feedback received indicated that clients wanted them to keep it simple.
Using LiveCut, as with SnappyTV, is fairly straightforward. You can set an in and an out on your live timeline, add in some metadata (such as a title and short description), compose your tweet, and quickly publish a video to your account. We wanted to honor some of those design principals such that there was some familiarity with clipping in this new product, says Cohen.
It's the integration within Twitter's Media Studio where content distributors will find some new value to play around with. With LiveCut, users can live-clip any piece of video content that either is currently live or has been either posted to one's Twitter account or captured using a Twitter-based means, like Twitter's new camera or Periscope. LiveCut will also house all consumption metrics, like video views, time spent watching, completion rate for videos on an account.
The integration of the whole thing, I think, is the game-changer, says Cohen. Media Studio really becomes that one-stop shop for all of your publishing needs across Twitter. Media Studio for a long time has been a great source for managing all of your content across Twitter for monetizing it and analyzing it. Over the last year or so and now with the introduction of LiveCut, we have really bolstered the efficacy of our live product within Media Studio, and we've started to feel the impact of that not just from sports partners but also those on the advertiser side who are becoming more and more content creators in and of themselves.
Are there plans to expand on LiveCut and offer more tools and options for super-users, who might want to get more bang for their buck in their live clipping for Twitter? Sure. According to Cohen, this version of LiveCut is definitely a version 1.0, and Twitter believes deeply in the value the product brings to content creators of its platform. Investment in LiveCut will continue. Next iterations will depend on user feedback after a few months of use in the field.
There were critical principles to the product that we heard from our partners on and learned from our usability sessions; we wanted LiveCut to be fast, simple, and free, says Cohen. We chose to invest in that as early as possible. Keeping in mind, we have super-users like big sports leagues and collegiate athletic departments that want the robust features and functionality, but we knew we needed to nail those principles off the bat, and that's where we focused our attention at first with the understanding that we will continue to iterate on the product.
Twitter also found it very important to release the product over the summer, most notably to allow its many collegiate-sports partners to get their hands on it prior to the start of the new athletics season in August. Also, although SnappyTV will be shutting down, it won't go dark until the end of the calendar year.
We wanted to ensure that our partners had a really long lead time in getting familiar with LiveCut and slowly transitioning over to using LiveCut from SnappyTV, says Cohen. I felt it was really important that we offer our partners around six months or so to have that opportunity to transition.
Most recent headlines
02/01/2026
Freezing Florida: NHL's EVP, Entertainment Bob Chesterman on Taking the Wint...
02/01/2026
NHL Winter Classic 2026: TNT Sports Prepares for First NHL Outdoor Game in Sunsh...
02/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
02/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
02/01/2026
Any Given Day: Cork University Hospital premieres Wednesday 7 January on RT One and RT Player at 9:35pm
RT will debut a powerful new six-part documentary se...
02/01/2026
Friday 2 January 2026
All episodes of Heated Rivalry will be landing on Sky and...
02/01/2026
Sequins, chat shows, live sporting action, ground-breaking docuseries and brand-new Irish drama to kick off 2026
New Year, New Content Coming Soon across RT
...
01/01/2026
Latin Grammy Cultural Foundation Announces 2026 Noel Schajris Scholarship The scholarship will cover tuition and housing for one Berklee College of Music stud...
01/01/2026
New year, new games, all with RTX 5080-powered cloud energy. GeForce NOW is kicking off 2026 by looking back at an unforgettable year of wins and wildly high fr...
31/12/2025
Back to All News
NFL Christmas Gameday on Netflix Scores Again With the Lions-V...
30/12/2025
As the College Football Playoff Enters the Quarterfinals, ESPN Blows Out Its Meg...
30/12/2025
SVG's Best of 2025: Original ArticlesTake a look back at all our coverage of big-time productions, game-changing technologies, and state-of-the-art new faci...
30/12/2025
MELBOURNE, Fla., Dec. 30, 2025 - L3Harris Technologies (NYSE: LHX) will release its fourth quarter 2025 financial results before the market opens on Thursday, J...
30/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
30/12/2025
Your live countdown to 2026 with Inhaler, David Gray, Lyra, Garron Noone, Sharon...
30/12/2025
It marked the first civilian operational authorization for a HAPS flight in Europe, led by Space42's subsidiary, Mira Aerospace
The flight demonstrated HAP...
29/12/2025
San Francisco 49ers Strike Gold With Halftime Laser SpectacularStunning display caps $200 million renovation of Levi's Stadium techBy Dan Daley, Audio Edito...
29/12/2025
The Cup's Around the Corner: An Inside Look at Broadcast Preparations for th...
29/12/2025
SVG's Best of 2025: Longform VideoWatch the standout keynote conversations, deep dives, and panel discussions from the year for free on SVG PLAY!By Brandon ...
29/12/2025
From crisper Lossless audio and immersive music videos in beta to new Audiobooks+ plans, custom transitions between tracks, and in-app Messages, we keep levelin...
29/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
27/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
26/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
26/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
25/12/2025
Holiday lights are twinkling, hot cocoa's on the stove and gamers are settling in for a well-earned break.
Whether staying in or heading on a winter getawa...
24/12/2025
What is AI good for? Posted by MTI Film on December 24, 2025
What is AI good for?
What is AI good for?
It's been three years since ChatGPT first cap...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
RT has unveiled an exclusive first look at the new Dancing with the Stars promo...
24/12/2025
Back to All News
The Boyfriend' Season 2 Unveils Heartwarming Trailer, Key...
24/12/2025
Back to All News
Love, Fights, and Everything in Between: Badly in Love' Returns for Season 2
Entertainment
24 December 2025
GlobalJapan
Link copied t...
24/12/2025
Scripps Research study links sleep variability with sleep apnea and hypertension How consumers' digital activity trackers could enable personalized health s...
23/12/2025
How guilas Cibae as Dominican Winter League Games Are Locally Produced for Glob...
23/12/2025
BitFire's Jim Akimchuk on Supplying Scalability and Customization in the Clo...
23/12/2025
CAMB.AI Enables European Athletics to Offer Multi-Language SupportPlan is to eventually offer translation into all languages spoken in EuropeBy Ken Kerschbaumer...
23/12/2025
Analysis: As sports media values trend negative, scarcity and quality are king By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Monday, December 22, 2025 - 14:08
Print ...
23/12/2025
ESPN, Disney, and NBA Return to the Animated Altcast Fray With Second Edition of...
23/12/2025
End the Year on a High Note and Donate to the Sports Broadcasting Fund Today!By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, December 23, 2025 - 12:25 pm
P...
23/12/2025
The year is winding down, the weather outside is frightful, and it's the perfect time to escape into a story that warms the heart. For listeners looking for...
23/12/2025
A Zeus motor is hot fire tested at L3Harris' Camden, Arkansas, solid rocket ...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Lightware will exhibit several major product innovations at ISE 2026, including the new USB-C BOOSTER-V1, Google Meet. integration for various Taurus UCX models...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
Twitter Releases Video-Clipping Tool LiveCut. What Does It Mean for Sports-Video Pros? The social-media platform will also be shutting down SnappyTV at the end of the year By Brandon Costa, Director of Digital 
