The new hip thing on the social media scene is GIFS!!!!!

If anyone reading this blog is familiar at all with self hosted WordPress sites they may know of a plugin called Jetpack provided by WordPress themselves. You connect your blog to WordPress.com which can be quite handy for more than a few items, such as spam protection, the option to syndicate your posts to social media websites the moment you make your blog post, and more where that came from. One thing they’ve been pushing with the newest version of WordPress is the new Gutenberg post editor, and they sent me an email to get me hyped about an all new feature that would totally be worth switching to Gutenberg for… FUCKING GIFS!!

Animated images — also known as GIFs — have become one of the hottest social media tools.

Whoa, you mean to tell me that GIFS… a picture format that was invented around the time I came into being…. is now a hot young social media tool? That’s oddly appropriate since most people in my age group at work happen to be tools on social media!

They tell a story, add humor and emotion, and can create a lasting impression on millions of readers.

Your move Jetpack…

The newest version of Jetpack adds a GIF block for the new editor, putting the world’s largest GIF library at your fingertips.

Perhaps I’ll give Gutenberg another shot at some point just to see the gif selection sometime in the not too distant future, if I’m bored enough…

Why say something with words when you can say it with a dancing turtle?

Wait, they taught Mitch McConnell how to dance? :morty: :rick:

Auf wiedersehen Gutenberg

In a recent update to WordPress (starting with 5.0 IIRC) they changed the text editor style to a new version called Gutenberg that changes the way you write your posts. This was being tested in earlier versions of WordPress as a mere plugin, out of curiocity I took a quick look at it during that period and went back to the regular style at the time just because I didn’t have much time to scope it out. Fast forward to the 5.0 update and now everyone has to use it (unless you install the classic editor plugin). I was tempted to go back to the classic editor myself, but then I decided to test myself by writing some posts with it.

Upon immediate glance I can tell this is designed for posting via smart devices… that’s strike 1. It’s great to include more devices so you can give writers a chance to post their thoughts or content from almost anywhere, but at the same time you shouldn’t neglect your other audience that holds a powerful tool that most mobile users sorely lack, a well sized keyboard to type on.

Gutenberg’s most praised feature is the “block” system… because this is 2018 and blocks are a thing. Instead of having a small toolbar and clicking an icon, like blockquoting something or posting an image, you click a plus and choose if you want an image, a quote, hell even a paragraph! You know, something you could write NATURALLY! Again, it makes more sense on mobile… but on PC that’s just an added step. Though not to completely bash it I do like being able to move paragraphs and other blocks around if I feel the need to arrange something.

I’ve mainly gone back to using the classic editor plugin. I like some of the ideas they’ve put into the new editor, but the inconveniences outweigh the new features. I’ll stick with the classic editor for now.