YouTube is playing around with video thumbnails that move like GIFs
Did I just see something move?
Tooling around YouTube -- for work purposes, I'm sure -- I noticed a little flash of motion in the right-hand column, that vertical stack of thumbnail images from the "up next" videos that the algorithm chooses for us.
A few minutes later, as I went scrolling through the column, and ... it happened again! The "up next" videos' display images moved in short loops -- just like a GIF.
It only happens when you mouse over the thumbnails, but it definitely happens:
Apparently, not everyone's seeing it yet -- right now this tiny tweak to the interface is just an experiment that's only out to a few select users.
We asked YouTube what the deal was, and they played it coy:
"With more videos coming to YouTube every minute we're always experimenting with ways to help people more easily find, watch and share the videos that matter most to them," YouTube said in a statement. "We'll consider rolling features out more broadly based on feedback on these experiments."
Our feedback, for the record: Cool! Go for it.
Topics YouTube
Josh Dickey is Mashable's Entertainment Editor, leading Mashable's TV, music, gaming and sports reporters as well as writing movie features and reviews.Josh has been the Film Editor at Variety, Entertainment Editor at The Associated Press and Managing Editor at TheWrap.com.A finalist for the Los Angeles Press Club's Best Entertainment Feature in 2015 for "Everyone is Altered: The Secret Hollywood Procedure that Fooled Us for Years," Josh received his BA in Journalism from The University of Minnesota.In between screenings, he can be found skating longboards, shredding guitar and wandering the streets of his beloved downtown Los Angeles.
