Like A Gif - Facebook Makes Looping Videos Into Profile Pics

[Fanghawk]

Like A Gif - Facebook Makes Looping Videos Into Profile Pics

[vimeo=140852546]Facebook is making some changes to keep up with the competition, including the ability to make seven-second profile pic videos.

Let's say you are Facebook. You're one of the world's biggest name brands, <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/142157-Mark-Zuckerberg-Confirms-One-Billion-People-Used-Facebook-In-One-Day>billions of people visit your site, and <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/features/14712-Oculus-Connect-2-Big-Announcements-and-Coolest-Tech>are you even have a foothold in growing VR tech markets. Cutting-edge research and marketing teams are at your disposal to maintain your position as the undisputed leader of social media. What new service can you roll out to make your service more appealing? Today we found out the answer: Getting the option to make your profile picture a looping seven-second video.

Facebook is catching up to GIF technology, ladies and gentlemen. God help us all.

Video profile images are just one feature revealed in a Facebook blog post today, and all kidding aside, some of these do sound useful. Temporary profile pictures are one example, which can be used to commemorate a milestone or event before reverting to your standard image. The Celebrate Pride filter most of us saw a few months ago was a great example, but it can also be used for birthdays, vacations, or upcoming sports games.

"Profile pictures are not just static portraits," the post reads. "They represent what's going in your life right now and what's important to you, and we want to give people the tools to better express themselves in this way."

Meanwhile, the social media giant is taking a few hints from Twitter. Improved Profile Controls will add a customizable space at the top of your page, letting you pin five featured photos alongside biographical details. On top of that, all these changes are supported on mobile apps thanks to recent design changes.

Of course, looping videos will still be the most noticeable feature. Facebook seems to hope it will make profiles more engaging, letting you "show a part of yourself you couldn't before, and add a new dimension to your profile". Of course, even if the design looks great, there are financial elements to consider. These changes put a stronger emphasis on up-to-date biographies, which are crucial to advertisers.

Regardless, with roughly four billion visits to the site each day, we'll find out pretty quickly whether the changes are a success or not. What do you think of Facebook's GI... sorry, looping video profile pics?

Source: Facebook, via <a href=http://techcrunch.com/2015/09/30/facebook-profile-gif/#.umotoy:AEWU>Tech Crunch

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[Barbas]

"A picture says a thousand words, but now you can join us in counting down the Time To MeatSpin."[footnote]Actual quote from Mark Zuckerberg because who's going to be bothered to check this, I mean what are you, sad or something?[/footnote]

My chips are on it being under 1 hour.

 

[Andy Shandy]

Looks like it might be time to add the Donkey Kong punch to Facebook too.

 

[Covarr]

This change brought to you by metered data plans.

P.S. Thanks

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

Oh boy, this is going to get annoying fast. <.<

Facebook irks me enough as is. When I'm on it, its usually for business and I only really like gifs in an informal setting like here...

Fun.

 

[Fiz_The_Toaster]

Oh boy, this is going to get annoying fast. <.<

Facebook irks me enough as is. When I'm on it, its usually for business and I only really like gifs in an informal setting like here...

Fun.

Yeah, my pages chugs as it is when a video decides to play itself and there's a bunch of other links to things that people post.

I think they should be fixing the bugs so scrolling isn't a massive pain in the ass rather than adding gifs as a profile pic.

But hey, what do I know?

 

[Eclipse Dragon]

Now I can set my Facebook pictures on fire too.

 

[jamail77]

Oh boy, this is going to get annoying fast. <.<

Facebook irks me enough as is. When I'm on it, its usually for business and I only really like gifs in an informal setting like here...

Fun.

You have an interesting way of using Facebook. I can't ever imagine using Facebook for business, at least not consistently or for the long term. Facebook is pretty much mostly informal to me. I do SOMETIMES (not relying on it; nobody call me sad or stupid for this darn it) it use to as a convenient feed for news since I follow a lot of journalists and people in the tech industry and like news media pages...although the people at the NPR Facebook social media team need to get their act together. And, I've joined groups created by professors and/or students for classes. Other than that, very informal for me.

Yeah, my pages chugs as it is when a video decides to play itself and there's a bunch of other links to things that people post.

I think they should be fixing the bugs so scrolling isn't a massive pain in the ass rather than adding gifs as a profile pic.

But hey, what do I know?

Mine doesn't. Are you sure that isn't something to do with the relationship between your browser and its extensions, the number of tabs you have open or, heck, things you are doing at the same time in general, your computer, and/or your Internet connection?

What's wrong with scrolling? Does it go too slow for you or something? Does it go back up to the top when the feed gets updated? Do you have to wait for things to load too often and for too long when you scroll down very fast? I've never had a serious problem with it.

Just to be clear, I'm not saying that just because I don't have problems you don't. I just have never seen or heard of these issues and I'm curious. The most recent issue I've had with Facebook is them disabling Facebook Payments on me because of what they THOUGHT was suspicious activity and some recent glitches in messaging differences between devices. Basically, one device will say a message was seen while the other won't say anything in the same moment of time.

Now I can set my Facebook pictures on fire too.

Living the dream.

 

[Fiz_The_Toaster]

Yeah, my pages chugs as it is when a video decides to play itself and there's a bunch of other links to things that people post.

I think they should be fixing the bugs so scrolling isn't a massive pain in the ass rather than adding gifs as a profile pic.

But hey, what do I know?

Mine doesn't. Are you sure that isn't something to do with the relationship between your browser and its extensions, the number of tabs you have open or, heck, things you are doing at the same time in general, your computer, and/or your Internet connection?

What's wrong with scrolling? Does it go too slow for you or something? Does it go back up to the top when the feed gets updated? Do you have to wait for things to load too often and for too long when you scroll down very fast? I've never had a serious problem with it.

Just to be clear, I'm not saying that just because I don't have problems you don't. I just have never seen or heard of these issues and I'm curious. The most recent issue I've had with Facebook is them disabling Facebook Payments on me because of what they THOUGHT was suspicious activity and some recent glitches in messaging differences between devices. Basically, one device will say a message was seen while the other won't say anything in the same moment of time.

I only have one other tab open, and I really don't use very many extensions. I use, like, two or three and that's mainly for YT.

I've looked into those issues and my internet is fine, and so is my browser. I really don't know what the deal is, but I have a feeling it might have to do with who I'm friended with on Facebook since just about every other person posts videos of something, and most of them auto play. It's really annoying.

I should point out that the scrolling is fine for most of the time, but every now and then it just chugs just to load things. I really don't get it.

All in all, it doesn't bother me since I only check FB only twice a day, so it's not like I live on it.

 

[jamail77]

I really don't know what the deal is, but I have a feeling it might have to do with who I'm friended with on Facebook since just about every other person posts videos of something, and most of them auto play. It's really annoying.

OK. I know what's wrong.

1) Despite having 339 friends on Facebook, very few of them post videos. Couple that with the fact I set my newsfeed to show certain things first, others by default, others prioritized over others, and some not at all and I don't have anything that intensive slowing me down. Facebook wasn't built to handle that much stuff at once if your predicament is as video intensive as it sounds it is. I don't know of many sites that are built for that and even those that are still need the user to have a VERY, VERY good Internet connection.

2) I didn't even know Facebook auto-played videos. And, now I know why. I did a quick search on the topic and realized I turned that off a long time ago. Go to Settings->Videos and then turn auto-play videos off. Unless you want Facebook to auto-play and not chug, which is honestly not feasible.

 

[Fiz_The_Toaster]

I really don't know what the deal is, but I have a feeling it might have to do with who I'm friended with on Facebook since just about every other person posts videos of something, and most of them auto play. It's really annoying.

OK. I know what's wrong.

1) Despite having 339 friends on Facebook, very few of them post videos. Couple that with the fact I set my newsfeed to show certain things first, others by default, others prioritized over others, and some not at all and I don't have anything that intensive slowing me down. Facebook wasn't built to handle that much stuff at once if your predicament is as video intensive as it sounds it is. I don't know of many sites that are built for that and even those that are still need the user to have a VERY, VERY good Internet connection.

2) I didn't even know Facebook auto-played videos. And, now I know why. I did a quick search on the topic and realized I turned that off a long time ago. Go to Settings->Videos and then turn auto-play videos off. Unless you want Facebook to auto-play and not chug, which is honestly not feasible.

1. Yeah, I don't have that many friends, but for some reason they all post like grandmas. XD

2. I'll have to look into that. I know YT videos don't do that, but there are videos that do though. The audio doesn't play automatically though, thank God. I'm gonna turn that off because it can be super annoying, especially if the ads autoload too. Thanks for the heads up.

 

[jamail77]

1. Yeah, I don't have that many friends, but for some reason they all post like grandmas. XD

2. I'll have to look into that. I know YT videos don't do that, but there are videos that do though. The audio doesn't play automatically though, thank God. I'm gonna turn that off because it can be super annoying, especially if the ads autoload too. Thanks for the heads up.

1. You poor thing.

2. These links will probably make it easier on you. Facebook Help Center directly on the topic and Facebook Community in the Help Center on the topic. The audio probably doesn't load because you turned the most common video player aside from Youtube's audio off when it annoyed you. The video players tend to stay as you set them I believe.

As long as the GIFs only play when you hover your mouse over them this should be fine. Otherwise, I would worry this is pushing it for people with the problems I wondered you were having a few replies back before you demonstrated that was not the case. [user]Eclipse Dragon[/user]'s fire would be lost on so many people. :'(

 

[Strazdas]

at first i was confused but by the end it seems that the author was confused as well. so is it looping videos or gifs? because you know the two are a different thing. if the image is anything to go by, they show gif quality, but it could be just compression of escapist hosting.

That being said, when is escapist going to start supporting HTML5 video? so far i found no way to embed .webM.

Yeah, my pages chugs as it is when a video decides to play itself and there's a bunch of other links to things that people post.

video is supposed to start autoplaying when you move your mouse on it. they dont always correctly decide where your mouse is.