Have you ever noticed how Facebook lacks of GIF animated images? Yup, just still photos and uploaded videos (either personally or from YouTube) propagate on your News Feed. That is because the social media giant actually removed its support for the cute *.gif.
It has been removed due to the negative output it had on the News Feed section of Facebook. However, overtime the web support and use for the GIFs had been boosted. Most blog sites make use of these images to capture humor and interests alike of the readers and viewers. Even other social media evolved their support of the GIF files. It’s relatively important then, that FB should take the plunge of embracing the GIF support.
As of this moment of writing, Facebook’s GIF support is already on-going. No hacks required, but uploading for these images is a no-no. To avoid the mistakes of the past, FB could only support the said file if—and only if—you are using a link. Might as well remind you, the GIF link should be ended with a *.gif. Additionally, the said links can only work on personal accounts and not on brand pages. Putting the link on the a brand page only results into a static image, not an animated one.
Ah, one thing more: GIF support works just fine on mobile phones like iPhone (it works perfectly well with the latest iOS version). On the other hand, when you scroll along your News Feed section using a laptop or desktop computer, the animation won’t be available automatically. An indicator tells you if it is a GIF file and you need to click on the image to animate it.
Of course, we should expect that this is just the beginning of great things for the GIFs. (We all know how the developers of Facebook are dedicated to expansion of horizons, right?)