Gfycat

Gfycat, Inc.
Gfycat logo
Available inEnglish, German, Dutch, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Czech, Polish, Russian, Korean, Japanese
Founded2015; 9 years ago (2015)
DissolvedSeptember 1, 2023; 15 months ago (2023-09-01)
HeadquartersEdmonton, Alberta, Canada
OwnerSnap Inc
Founder(s)
  • Jeff Harris
  • Dan McEleney
  • Richard Rabbat
ServicesCreate, discover, and share GIFs and short videos
URLgfycat.com (Archived September 1, 2023, at the Wayback Machine)
Users220 million monthly active users
Current statusDefunct

Gfycat (/ˈdʒɪfiːˌkæt/ JIFEE-cat)[1] was a user-generated short video hosting company founded by Richard Rabbat, Dan McEleney, and Jeff Harris.

History

Founded in 2013 in Edmonton, Canada, Gfycat was among the first web services to offer video encoding of GIFs. It was incorporated in the United States in 2015, and raised $10 million in a 2016 seed funding round.[2]

Gfycat offered a web platform for uploading and hosting short video content, as well as an iMessage app,[3][4] an Android app,[5] and the GIF Brewery macOS application for GIF and video creation.[6] It also had integrations with Reddit,[7] the messaging app Tango,[8] Microsoft Outlook,[9] Skype,[10] and WordPress,[11] among others. It was a finalist for the 2016 Advertising Age Creativity Awards in the "Startup to Watch" category.[12]

In 2016, Gfycat ranked within the top 57 websites in the U.S by traffic,[13] with over 130 million monthly active users in 2017.[14][15][16] Its users were primarily concentrated in English-speaking countries, with a significant foothold in Europe and Latin America. It supported sixteen languages, including English, French, Spanish, Russian, Ukrainian, Japanese, Chinese (traditional and simplified), Korean, and Arabic. Users fell primarily in the 18-35 age range.

Gfycat had offices in Edmonton, Alberta and Palo Alto, California.

In 2018 Gfycat had an alleged data breach; an estimated 8 million accounts were compromised, and its database was put for sale on the Dream Market.[17]

In December 2019, Gfycat started redgifs.com for adult content.[18]

In May 2020, Gfycat was acquired by Snap Inc,[19] parent company of Snapchat.[20] On May 12, 2020, Gfycat banned adult content completely.[21]

On May 18, 2023 the TLS certificate for gfycat.com expired. Problems with uploading had been reported for months prior to the certificate's expiration, with a lack of response from the company's support. On May 22, the TLS certificate was renewed, with a Snap Inc. spokesperson describing it as a "temporary issue", though problems with uploading to the site remained.[22]

On June 30, 2023, Gfycat announced it would discontinue service on September 1, 2023.[23] On September 1, 2023, the website was taken down.

References

  1. ^ "About | Gfycat". Gfycat.com. Archived from the original on 13 November 2020. Retrieved 18 Sep 2019.
  2. ^ Kolodny, Lora (September 22, 2016). "Gfycat raises $10 million to help creatives fire up the memes". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on February 16, 2019. Retrieved October 12, 2016.
  3. ^ "Gfycat Loops - Product Hunt". Product Hunt. 13 September 2016. Archived from the original on October 13, 2016. Retrieved October 12, 2016.
  4. ^ Perez, Sarah (October 28, 2016). "Gfycat brings its higher quality GIFs and DIY creation tools to iMessage". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on October 29, 2016. Retrieved November 25, 2016.
  5. ^ "Gfycat launches mobile GIF creator for Android". VentureBeat. 12 December 2016. Archived from the original on 2016-12-13. Retrieved 2017-02-17.
  6. ^ Perez, Sarah (November 2, 2016). "Gfycat snaps up Mac app GIF Brewery to expand its GIF creation capabilities to the desktop". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on November 3, 2016. Retrieved November 25, 2016.
  7. ^ "Gfycat's new Reddit bot supplies your dancing cat images on demand". Digital Trends. 2017-04-13. Archived from the original on 2017-10-17. Retrieved 2017-10-16.
  8. ^ "Tango now lets you post GIFs from the largest user-generated database in the world". The Daily Dot. 2017-02-14. Archived from the original on 2018-09-21. Retrieved 2017-02-25.
  9. ^ "Microsoft Outlook for Android now supports add-ins like Evernote and Trello". The Verge. Archived from the original on 2017-10-17. Retrieved 2017-10-16.
  10. ^ Perez, Sarah. "Skype's Snapchat-inspired makeover puts the camera a swipe away, adds stories". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on 2020-09-24. Retrieved 2017-10-16.
  11. ^ "Gfycat for WordPress". WordPress.org. Archived from the original on 2017-10-17. Retrieved 2017-10-16.
  12. ^ "See the Finalists for Ad Age's Creativity Awards". Archived from the original on 2021-01-24. Retrieved 2017-10-16.
  13. ^ "Top Sites in United States - Alexa". www.alexa.com. Archived from the original on April 4, 2009. Retrieved October 12, 2016.
  14. ^ Lynley, Matthew. "Gfycat hits 130M monthly active users as short form video heats up". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on 2017-10-28. Retrieved 2017-10-30.
  15. ^ Snowdon, Wallis (October 6, 2016). "GIFs are big business for Edmonton's Gfycat start-up". CBC News. Archived from the original on October 13, 2016. Retrieved October 12, 2016.
  16. ^ Kokalitcheva, Kia (November 7, 2016). "Here's How Gfycat Hopes to Stand Out From Other Social Media Apps". Fortune. Archived from the original on November 25, 2016. Retrieved November 25, 2016.
  17. ^ Swati Khandelwal (February 18, 2019). "620 million accounts stolen from 16 hacked websites now for sale on dark web, seller boasts". TheHackerNews. Archived from the original on February 19, 2019. Retrieved February 18, 2019.
  18. ^ Cole, Samantha (2023-05-22). "RIP Gfycat, the First Site To Make Gifs Look Good (UPDATED)". VICE. Retrieved 2024-08-24.
  19. ^ Mceleney, Dan. "Dan Mceleney post on LinkedIn". www.linkedin.com. Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  20. ^ Sandle, Paul (25 April 2022). "Meta fights to overturn UK order to sell Giphy". Yahoo Finance. Archived from the original on 22 September 2022. Retrieved 19 September 2022.
  21. ^ Cole, Samantha (2023-05-22). "RIP Gfycat, the First Site To Make Gifs Look Good (UPDATED)". VICE. Retrieved 2024-08-24.
  22. ^ Cole, Samantha (22 May 2023). "RIP Gfycat, the First Site To Make Gifs Look Good (UPDATED)". Vice. Retrieved 24 May 2023.
  23. ^ "Gfycat | Watch and Create GIFs, Videos, Memes". Gfycat.com. Archived from the original on 2023-06-30. Retrieved 2023-07-02. After September 1, 2023, all Gfycat content and data will be deleted from gfycat.com