1996·Early web, before YouTube
The GIF
An image format from 1987 that became the internet's way of having a facial expression.
You might remember it as animated GIF, reaction GIF
A looping animation
- SourceNo single original
- MediaNot held by ViralWorld
What this was
A gif classified under reactions.
It first appeared in 1996, during early web, before YouTube.
The GIF is the longest continuously used cultural form the internet has. It carried the spinning envelopes and under-construction signs of the 1990s personal web, the dancing baby, the entire reaction economy of Tumblr and Twitter, and eventually a keyboard button on every phone. It also produced the internet's most cheerfully irresolvable argument — hard g or soft g — which its creator settled in 2013 by announcing the answer, and which nobody accepted.
Technically it has been obsolete for years: most things called GIFs today are silent looping MP4s served by GIF platforms. The Atlantic wrote its obituary in 2022 and was wrong in the way such obituaries usually are. Steve Wilhite died in 2022; his headstone reads GIF.
Early web, before YouTube
- Crazy Frog 2003Early web, before YouTube
- Rejected Cartoons 2000Early web, before YouTube
- Bad Day office video 1997Early web, before YouTube
- Dancing Baby 1996Early web, before YouTube
- Shipping 1996Early web, before YouTube
- Scary Maze Game 2004Early web, before YouTube
- Dean Scream 2004Early web, before YouTube
- Salad Fingers 2004Early web, before YouTube
- This Land (JibJab) 2004Early web, before YouTube
- Ding Dong Song 2004Early web, before YouTube
Related
- The hashtag 2007Early YouTube
- Moldy showers and no soap: Military families OUTRAGED by conditions on USS Lincoln 2026The last few years
- Romantic Surprise Wedding Proposal Caught on Camera 2016The platform era
- Watch The Most Cringeworthy Marriage Proposal Fail 2016The platform era
- Surprise Proposal at Olive Garden 2012The social era
- Greatest moment from my dad's surprise party caught on camera 2011The social era
- Funny dog video - Tickling dog, you will SMILE! 2011The social era
- 004 Throwing a Surprise Party 2010The social era
Grouped by explicit relationships where evidence exists, and by shared theme otherwise.
Behind the recordWhere it came from
There is no original to identify: this spread through many separate posts at once rather than from a first one. ViralWorld holds no copy of it either — what it was, when it spread and what people called it is the record.
Nothing here is claimed to be the first version of this, because research established there was not one — it appeared in many places at once.
Not established. This index only names a creator where the evidence supports it.
- What happens
- A gif classified under reactions.