If gifs are cringe, I don't want to be cool

Poor Giphy. The one-time darling behind 2010s Internet-speak is now arguing that Meta needs to own it — because no one else wants to . Last year the UK's competition watchdog ordered Meta to sell Giphy , which it had acquired in 2020 for roughly $315 million. But the app's popularity has continued to wane, and Giphy's chief argument in the filing is that a forced sale would be its death knell. The app is "now less attractive than it was two years ago," and "the universe of potentially interested purchasers is limited," the filing notes. Ouch.

Now, the jokes practically write themselves. Gifs are — allegedly — as "cringe" to Gen Z as email chain letters, or a Facebook "poke" from your great-aunt, were to millennials. Throw gifs in the outdated pile next to the "crying while laughing" emoji or your MySpace Top 8.

But it's not that straightforward. As the Guardian explains , at least some of Giphy's current struggle comes from the fact that gifs are ubiquitous; keyboards (some powered by Giphy, some by competitors like Tenor) are built into most major communication apps. And because so many popular gifs come from entertainment brands, the medium is fraught with copyright and partnership issues. Companies like Giphy are only as strong as the deals they can make with content partners — which also means all gif libraries start to look the same.

"Don't let your strategy be someone else's tactic," as the adage says. Being the "Google of gifs" is a service, but without a truly unique offering, gif search is a utility that can easily be replicated. When the content looks largely the same across multiple apps, it's not distinctly different from an emoji keyboard.

But what I find fascinating about this whole saga isn't just what it means for Giphy, the brand (indeed, my Gen Z cousin had never heard of it), but for modern communication.

As I wrote in my last article , this current "vibe" puts a premium on individual expression. TikTok videos can become global viral moments, but there are also micro-communities and micro-influencers for what feels like any category under the sun. Memes can go down endless referential spirals (like "girl explaining to guy" ) and be adapted quickly and easily to suit different sub-groups. And that's not even getting into platforms like BeReal, which are about as individualistic as you can get.

Gifs just aren't built like that. Literally. The format doesn't allow for easy saving, editing or sharing; it's why many millennials (self included) used to have gif folders holding our most unique gif treasures. But, let's be real: That's a pain, especially on mobile. Communication in 2022 is faster and more casual than ever before — we want to be able to remix, respond, synthesize, personalize, amalgamate... instantly.

"The gift economy around gifs has shifted," Syracuse University's Whitney Phillips tells Vice . "Rather than looking far and wide to find a gif to send you, it’s clicking the search button and typing a word." Making them accessible and ubiquitous has, unsurprisingly, made them less special. And it's part of a larger shift in how social media reflects or creates the world around it — "the primary function of social media" has moved "from expression of culture to source of culture," VMLY&R's Amy Worley explains to AdAge . Social media is a creation engine, not merely a reflection of trends and cultural moments happening around it. ("I’m used to seeing a lot of content made by people themselves rather than relying on a muted video of Phoebe from Friends," comments 28-year-old podcaster Erika Gajda .)

All that said: Are gifs going the way of the dodo? Absolutely not.

Gifs are a way of conveying information and sentiment, the same as emojis, abbreviations, colloquialisms, memes or any of the other tools we now have at our disposal. And it's undeniable that images or gifs can get some messages across more easily than text— to say nothing of their ability to cut across language barriers.

So I'm going to embrace my millennial cringe and keep sharing gifs to my heart's content. Life's too short to be Homer Simpson disappearing into the bushes .