User blog:UltraGrenburr12678/Excessive .gifs

The regular editors on this site have come to a consensus that there are too many .gif files, being used too liberally. This causes at least two major problems:


 * 1) It makes the page heavier: .gifs are considered "large" files, they can go up to 10MB in size contrasted to that of .png or .jpg images, which are typically less than 1 MB. This causes the page to take longer to load. Also, it takes up a lot of data for those browsing on data plans.
 * 2) .gifs can freeze: We don't know why this happens. Large gifs approaching the maximum 10MB size can randomly and unexpectedly freeze on their first frame; this problem is on Wikia/FANDOM's side and we can do nothing about it, neither can we detect when they freeze. We also don't know if/when this glitch will get fixed.

The point of a .gif is to show something that cannot be demonstrated well using a single static png or jpg, like an Ultra's finisher technique or transformation sequence for example. That said, things like monsters shooting simple heat rays from their mouths, or generic cannons being shot, do not need to have .gifs. To cite the most recent example at the time of writing this blog post:

Compare this:

With this:

You would probably have noticed that the .gif took a significantly longer time to load. Also do note that the bottom image would be sufficiently appropriate to show what Zetton is doing and how it is being performed. This makes the .gif file redundant.

In conclusion: before going through all the trouble of making a gif, just ask yourself if a casual wiki reader really needs to see it. If the answer is no, do not bother putting it on the page.