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Congrats to Giphy, but honestly it baffles me they are worth this much money. Do they actually bring in decent revenue, or was this all about eyeballs? Is this

Congrats to Giphy, but honestly it baffles me they are worth this much money. Do they actually bring in decent revenue, or was this all about eyeballs? Is this content even decently monetizable? Disclaimer: I am the jaded creator of Twicsy, a Twitter picture engine with many millions of visitors over its lifetime, and I apparently missed the boat on this trends and had to shut it down.

snissn 6y ago
They're integrated into a lot of apps and maybe even apple's OS. In addition to those integration and business relationships they probably have some sort of data sharing / ad tech thingy that's worth some money on its own.
- kennxfl 6y ago
  Makes sense because Whatsapp is a client.
ogre_codes 6y ago
I was surprised it it carried this kind of valuation too, but I think this is a matter of finding the right buyer. This isn't about revenue, it's another way for Facebook to harvest metrics, this time across competing products.
basch 6y ago
The other interesting thing about this one, is that they dont even attempt to license content do they? They dont have any content costs? Theres been this fake (steal) it till you make it, wild west approach to growth. Youtube, Buzzfeed, Imgur. You just host anybodys content regardless of if the poster is the owner, and once you get to scale, then you handle copyright and creating your own content so you arent as dependent on external creators. But in Giphys case, they never have to take the extra step. Because they are so short, they are much more likely to pass fair use, and they can just host anybodys anything, barring some illegal fringes, without having to pay for the rights.
- parineum 6y ago
  Facebook, Twitter and Google (YouTube) have used that strategy to ignore their obligations to filter their content by getting into some type of "too bug to fail" situation and throwing their hands up when they are asked to do their duty. Those products didn't fill a niche by innovating, they filled a niche by ignoring the obligations that were preventing others from filling the niche.
  - rhizome 6y ago
    "Behind every great fortune is a crime."
  - gundmc 6y ago
    > Facebook, Twitter and Google (YouTube) have used that strategy to ignore their obligations to filter their content by getting into some type of "too bug to fail" situation and throwing their hands up when they are asked to do their duty I don't think this is quite fair to YouTube. They've spent hundreds of millions of dollars developing ContentID. It's not perfect, but it's without a doubt the most sophisticated system to date. It's a difficult problem, but I don't see how you can say they've "thrown up their hands".
    - pbhjpbhj 6y ago
      I thought the DMCA reporting system was basically made for Google (maybe by Google???) so they could have a middle-ground. They shift responsibility to content owners, through the law; then sell themselves as virtuous through ContentID and keep enough infringing content to not too deleteriously effect their platform -- collecting ad revenue even on content they allow that's infringing. You can say what you like, but that's genius level politics-business IMO.
      - zarriak 6y ago
        no their problem is that the DMCA system sucks as it wasn't even written this century (1998), so they created ContentID as a response. They do benefit from the way the system exists currently because of this since the cost of developing a competitor to ContentID is so seemingly prohibitively expensive that nobody else tries to do what YouTube does.
cosmie 6y ago
Read the privacy policy[1]. Think of Giphy images as a giant, organically shared version of web tracking software. Which complements the coverage of the FB Pixel[2] well, as it worms its way into privacy-conscious areas they might not have FB Pixel coverage such as private communications and security/privacy-minded apps. And without implementing something like a proxy server to pre-cache/sanitize images and strip tracking identifiers in both directions, it's a tracking vector that's hard to keep out of your app without introducing user friction. Given that cynical viewpoint, the valuation makes a ton of sense. [1] https://support.giphy.com/hc/en-us/articles/360032872931-GIPHY-Privacy-Policy https://support.giphy.com/hc/en-us/articles/360032872931-GIP... [2] https://www.facebook.com/business/help/742478679120153?id=1205376682832142 https://www.facebook.com/business/help/742478679120153?id=12...
- nerdponx 6y ago
  proxy server to pre-cache/sanitize images and strip tracking identifiers in both directions Developing such a tool might be valuable for privacy-conscious application developers.
  - cosmie 6y ago
    Google already does it with Gmail[1][2], so it's not unheard of. But it adds another layer of complexity, plus is somewhat antithetical to the privacy viewpoint as it then exposes all of the images to the app developer now since it's routed through the proxy server instead of direct end-user -> image server requests. [1] Can't find a page specifically detailing it, but [2] gives a basic synopsis on it in the context of allowing GSuite admins to whitelist internal domains from routing through the proxy. [2] https://support.google.com/a/answer/3299041?hl=en https://support.google.com/a/answer/3299041?hl=en
    - Jakob 6y ago
      > it then exposes all of the images to the _app developer_ Not if the app developer proxies the encrypted traffic. That way the app dev does not know the content and the third party does not know which original IP requested it. This is akin to the Signal-Giphy implementation.
101404 6y ago
It's all about collecting user data and usage data. Not about serving images.
trizzle21 6y ago
they do embed Ads into your gif searches... however, who knows what is happening to ad spend in these Covid times.

snissn 6y ago

They're integrated into a lot of apps and maybe even apple's OS. In addition to those integration and business relationships they probably have some sort of data sharing / ad tech thingy that's worth some money on its own.

kennxfl 6y ago
Makes sense because Whatsapp is a client.

ogre_codes 6y ago

I was surprised it it carried this kind of valuation too, but I think this is a matter of finding the right buyer. This isn't about revenue, it's another way for Facebook to harvest metrics, this time across competing products.

basch 6y ago

The other interesting thing about this one, is that they dont even attempt to license content do they? They dont have any content costs? Theres been this fake (steal) it till you make it, wild west approach to growth. Youtube, Buzzfeed, Imgur. You just host anybodys content regardless of if the poster is the owner, and once you get to scale, then you handle copyright and creating your own content so you arent as dependent on external creators. But in Giphys case, they never have to take the extra step. Because they are so short, they are much more likely to pass fair use, and they can just host anybodys anything, barring some illegal fringes, without having to pay for the rights.

parineum 6y ago
Facebook, Twitter and Google (YouTube) have used that strategy to ignore their obligations to filter their content by getting into some type of "too bug to fail" situation and throwing their hands up when they are asked to do their duty. Those products didn't fill a niche by innovating, they filled a niche by ignoring the obligations that were preventing others from filling the niche.
- rhizome 6y ago
  "Behind every great fortune is a crime."
- gundmc 6y ago
  > Facebook, Twitter and Google (YouTube) have used that strategy to ignore their obligations to filter their content by getting into some type of "too bug to fail" situation and throwing their hands up when they are asked to do their duty I don't think this is quite fair to YouTube. They've spent hundreds of millions of dollars developing ContentID. It's not perfect, but it's without a doubt the most sophisticated system to date. It's a difficult problem, but I don't see how you can say they've "thrown up their hands".
  - pbhjpbhj 6y ago
    I thought the DMCA reporting system was basically made for Google (maybe by Google???) so they could have a middle-ground. They shift responsibility to content owners, through the law; then sell themselves as virtuous through ContentID and keep enough infringing content to not too deleteriously effect their platform -- collecting ad revenue even on content they allow that's infringing. You can say what you like, but that's genius level politics-business IMO.
    - zarriak 6y ago
      no their problem is that the DMCA system sucks as it wasn't even written this century (1998), so they created ContentID as a response. They do benefit from the way the system exists currently because of this since the cost of developing a competitor to ContentID is so seemingly prohibitively expensive that nobody else tries to do what YouTube does.

cosmie 6y ago

Read the privacy policy[1]. Think of Giphy images as a giant, organically shared version of web tracking software. Which complements the coverage of the FB Pixel[2] well, as it worms its way into privacy-conscious areas they might not have FB Pixel coverage such as private communications and security/privacy-minded apps. And without implementing something like a proxy server to pre-cache/sanitize images and strip tracking identifiers in both directions, it's a tracking vector that's hard to keep out of your app without introducing user friction. Given that cynical viewpoint, the valuation makes a ton of sense. [1] https://support.giphy.com/hc/en-us/articles/360032872931-GIPHY-Privacy-Policy https://support.giphy.com/hc/en-us/articles/360032872931-GIP... [2] https://www.facebook.com/business/help/742478679120153?id=1205376682832142 https://www.facebook.com/business/help/742478679120153?id=12...

nerdponx 6y ago
proxy server to pre-cache/sanitize images and strip tracking identifiers in both directions Developing such a tool might be valuable for privacy-conscious application developers.
- cosmie 6y ago
  Google already does it with Gmail[1][2], so it's not unheard of. But it adds another layer of complexity, plus is somewhat antithetical to the privacy viewpoint as it then exposes all of the images to the app developer now since it's routed through the proxy server instead of direct end-user -> image server requests. [1] Can't find a page specifically detailing it, but [2] gives a basic synopsis on it in the context of allowing GSuite admins to whitelist internal domains from routing through the proxy. [2] https://support.google.com/a/answer/3299041?hl=en https://support.google.com/a/answer/3299041?hl=en
  - Jakob 6y ago
    > it then exposes all of the images to the _app developer_ Not if the app developer proxies the encrypted traffic. That way the app dev does not know the content and the third party does not know which original IP requested it. This is akin to the Signal-Giphy implementation.

101404 6y ago

It's all about collecting user data and usage data. Not about serving images.

trizzle21 6y ago

they do embed Ads into your gif searches... however, who knows what is happening to ad spend in these Covid times.