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https://blog.imgur.com/2014/10/09/introducing-gifv/ https://blog.imgur.com/2014/10/09/introducing-gifv/ has some of the details. It definitely makes sense tech

https://blog.imgur.com/2014/10/09/introducing-gifv/ https://blog.imgur.com/2014/10/09/introducing-gifv/ has some of the details. It definitely makes sense technically. It should in most cases reduce file size, and also allows you to stream content in buffered so you don't need to wait for the whole thing to load for it to play. (Though I believe streaming in gifs is teeeechnically possible? I feel like I saw a demo one time that made a clock by streaming in gif frames)

toomuchtodo 9y ago
https://hookrace.net/blog/time.gif/ https://hookrace.net/blog/time.gif/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14996715 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14996715
jessriedel 9y ago
Hey thanks, this is super useful! I still don't quite get it though. I understand that converting huge HD GIFs to a standard video format allows steaming and better compression, but why encourage people to upload it like this rather than just upload videos? The only explanation in the post is "the culture of the GIF now trumps the file format. With Project GIFV, Imgur is reimagining the looping GIF video with all the richness it deserves as a key piece of Internet culture." Is the idea just that people want soundless looping HD video, and they're accustomed to uploading GIFs, so Imgur is going to accommodate them by doing the conversions server-side? I guess this is an explanation, but it's a surprising one. For instance, it doesn't really fit well with the observation that people uploaded GIFs of content that was obviously native video and not connected to internet GIF culture, e.g., sports videos.
- Strom 9y ago
  Yes it's all about no sound. Everyone likes opening up a bunch of tabs that include auto-playing funny looping videos, but nobody likes auto-playing sound, especially if it overlaps with some other sound.
  - dspillett 9y ago
    I'm not sure if it is Chrome's doing or YouTube's, but if I open a couple of youtube links in tabs (a selection from the "related" list to the right of one I'm currently watching for instance) the clips in the new tabs don't start playing until that tab gains focus. This avoids the auto-playing sound overlapping problem and means you don't miss the start of the clip and drop in part way through. Surely this is the solution to that selection of requirements?
    - Strom 9y ago
      I've noticed the Chrome feature as well. I watch a lot of Twitch streams, and it causes a frustrating experience, albeit with possible workarounds by Twitch. It's that Twitch is about live streams and live chat, but now the video autoplay is delayed until I activate the tab, but chat is still live from the moment I clicked on the link. It basically buffers the stream now, but makes me go out of sync with chat. One alleviator could be Twitch adding a "go live" button that shows up when I'm not live. There are still two classes of problems unaffected by this change. 1) As is popular with gifs, there could very well be multiple of these autoplaying videos on the same page, probably even multiple fitting in the same viewport area. If they had sound, these would interfere with eachother. 2) My understanding is that many listen to music from some source unrelated to the webpage containing these autoplaying videos. So even if there's only one video, its autoplaying sound could easily mix with my tunes. Doing autoplaying sound is hard, but with gaze tracking and knowledge of system sound usage status, I think a pretty good solution is possible.
    - setzer22 9y ago
      That is not an (at least exclusive?) chrome feature, since it happens on Firefox as well.
  - _lce0 9y ago
    Also volume control on mobile is completely broken. You cannot easily control the volume until the video starts playing; not even when the video is still loading. https://xkcd.com/1884/ https://xkcd.com/1884/
wolfgang42 9y ago
> Though I believe streaming in gifs is teeeechnically possible? I feel like I saw a demo one time that made a clock by streaming in gif frames Maybe this one? (Now dead link): http://tycho.usno.navy.mil/utclock.html http://tycho.usno.navy.mil/utclock.html It's also possible to live-stream video as a GIF(!): gopher://sdf.org/0/users/irl/blog/2012-08-20-streaming-video-over-gopher.md (There was a discussion about this on the gopher-project mailing list in August 2012, but unfortunately GMane is down and I can't provide a link.)
ramses0 9y ago
Streaming with gif/jpg has been around since at least 2004[1] and doing some code spelunking mjpeg-tools was installable as a package since 2001[2]. [1]: https://www.linux.com/news/mjpeg-tools https://www.linux.com/news/mjpeg-tools [2]: https://sourceforge.net/p/mjpeg/Code/483/ https://sourceforge.net/p/mjpeg/Code/483/
- pedrocr 9y ago
  It doesn't have much to do with the gif/jpg formats though, it works with anything. It's just a multipart HTTP response that keeps sending entire new files to replace the previous one. It's not even a jpeg/gif encoding of the differences between frames which would be much more efficient.

toomuchtodo 9y ago

https://hookrace.net/blog/time.gif/ https://hookrace.net/blog/time.gif/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14996715 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14996715

jessriedel 9y ago

Hey thanks, this is super useful! I still don't quite get it though. I understand that converting huge HD GIFs to a standard video format allows steaming and better compression, but why encourage people to upload it like this rather than just upload videos? The only explanation in the post is "the culture of the GIF now trumps the file format. With Project GIFV, Imgur is reimagining the looping GIF video with all the richness it deserves as a key piece of Internet culture." Is the idea just that people want soundless looping HD video, and they're accustomed to uploading GIFs, so Imgur is going to accommodate them by doing the conversions server-side? I guess this is an explanation, but it's a surprising one. For instance, it doesn't really fit well with the observation that people uploaded GIFs of content that was obviously native video and not connected to internet GIF culture, e.g., sports videos.

Strom 9y ago
Yes it's all about no sound. Everyone likes opening up a bunch of tabs that include auto-playing funny looping videos, but nobody likes auto-playing sound, especially if it overlaps with some other sound.
- dspillett 9y ago
  I'm not sure if it is Chrome's doing or YouTube's, but if I open a couple of youtube links in tabs (a selection from the "related" list to the right of one I'm currently watching for instance) the clips in the new tabs don't start playing until that tab gains focus. This avoids the auto-playing sound overlapping problem and means you don't miss the start of the clip and drop in part way through. Surely this is the solution to that selection of requirements?
  - Strom 9y ago
    I've noticed the Chrome feature as well. I watch a lot of Twitch streams, and it causes a frustrating experience, albeit with possible workarounds by Twitch. It's that Twitch is about live streams and live chat, but now the video autoplay is delayed until I activate the tab, but chat is still live from the moment I clicked on the link. It basically buffers the stream now, but makes me go out of sync with chat. One alleviator could be Twitch adding a "go live" button that shows up when I'm not live. There are still two classes of problems unaffected by this change. 1) As is popular with gifs, there could very well be multiple of these autoplaying videos on the same page, probably even multiple fitting in the same viewport area. If they had sound, these would interfere with eachother. 2) My understanding is that many listen to music from some source unrelated to the webpage containing these autoplaying videos. So even if there's only one video, its autoplaying sound could easily mix with my tunes. Doing autoplaying sound is hard, but with gaze tracking and knowledge of system sound usage status, I think a pretty good solution is possible.
  - setzer22 9y ago
    That is not an (at least exclusive?) chrome feature, since it happens on Firefox as well.
- _lce0 9y ago
  Also volume control on mobile is completely broken. You cannot easily control the volume until the video starts playing; not even when the video is still loading. https://xkcd.com/1884/ https://xkcd.com/1884/

wolfgang42 9y ago

> Though I believe streaming in gifs is teeeechnically possible? I feel like I saw a demo one time that made a clock by streaming in gif frames Maybe this one? (Now dead link): http://tycho.usno.navy.mil/utclock.html http://tycho.usno.navy.mil/utclock.html It's also possible to live-stream video as a GIF(!): gopher://sdf.org/0/users/irl/blog/2012-08-20-streaming-video-over-gopher.md (There was a discussion about this on the gopher-project mailing list in August 2012, but unfortunately GMane is down and I can't provide a link.)

ramses0 9y ago

Streaming with gif/jpg has been around since at least 2004[1] and doing some code spelunking mjpeg-tools was installable as a package since 2001[2]. [1]: https://www.linux.com/news/mjpeg-tools https://www.linux.com/news/mjpeg-tools [2]: https://sourceforge.net/p/mjpeg/Code/483/ https://sourceforge.net/p/mjpeg/Code/483/

pedrocr 9y ago
It doesn't have much to do with the gif/jpg formats though, it works with anything. It's just a multipart HTTP response that keeps sending entire new files to replace the previous one. It's not even a jpeg/gif encoding of the differences between frames which would be much more efficient.