Why converts lemmy.world *.gif to *.mp4 ?

Isn’t *.gif more popular and easier to show direct/automatical in any browser and app?

    • A_A@lemmy.world
      0·
      1 year ago

      *.mp4 doesn’t show as thumbnail,
      *.gif readily shows as thumbnail for posts,
      Tested a few times, in post’s URL field.
      ( *.gif has to be on external web site )
      Maybe this is already in the list of improvements to be made ?

    • Lumidaub@feddit.de
      0·
      1 year ago

      What, really? I may be showing my age here but I always assumed that gifs, comprising nothing but a series of pictures, are way less complex than any video format, which is made to accommodate audio and subtitles and whatnot. Has that changed sometime in the last 20 years?

        • Lumidaub@feddit.deEnglish
          0·
          1 year ago

          GIFs are an average of 5-10 times larger than an efficiently encoded MP4 video

          So an automated process like Lemmy uses is efficient enough to do that? In my head, there exists a brain, somewhere, and I can’t even get digital copies of my dvds down to any manageable size without fiddling with Handbrake endlessly.