SHARING: The Phhhoto app allows users to share gifs with their friends.
By Michelle Boulos, Staff Writer
Social media has become an integral part of our culture and society in this day and age, especially for youth. From Twitter to Instagram, a new generation of applications has emerged where people can share their personal lives with their friends through creative outlets. The new Phhhoto app is perhaps one of the newest examples of the broadening advancements in interpersonal connections.
The Phhhoto app is not just simply sharing pictures or thoughts, but rather posting moving pictures, which are called GIFs. Not to be confused with videos, or even the six second looping videos called Vines, GIFs are quite literally “pictures that move.” These GIFs, which are just as mind bending and repetitive as the triple h in the application’s name, are just that: entertaining to take in, and never- ending. With just the click of a button, the application compiles frames from your movements within those few seconds, making a GIF.
The new form of expression allows people to make friends who will see their posts, which can range from anything: a GIF of a person running, their view from the passenger seat of a car or even a suspicious selfie of the user’s moving eyes.
The app has been embraced by the Poly student community, and students have found solace in such a unique form of personal sharing.
“I really liked the app at first because I felt like I could post anything. I think it’s a really cool app; it gives the artsy people a chance to be creative and the basic people a chance to give a huge smile and stick their tongue out in the same post,” Aubree Raya (10) said.
Others enjoy the app simply for its refreshing new take on social media. “It’s a new way to post photos and I like how the layout is different than other social media,” Nick Rock (10) expressed.
In fact, Poly’s principal, Dr. Michael Roe, has caught on with the trend as well. Introduced to the app by his teenage daughter, he has partaken and made an account with the app. “I think if used within reason, it has the potential to rival Instagram,” Roe said. “I think it has the the potential to catch on. It has a lot of really cool filters as well that promote individuality,” he elaborated.
The Phhhoto app showcases new imaging in the form of GIFs, and is one step further in technological advancement and creative expression in teenagers across the United States, including the Poly community. The trend may live on, and people will continue having a fffantastic time sharing.
GIF courtesy of the writers of Poly Spotlight.