Bitcoin Forum

I am wearing this avatar for a long time and it is an animated one. But for sometime now, animated avatar has been discontinued  and only static avatar can be worn.

Can i know the reason for this change because animated avatar looks more attractive and also it does not consume any extra data/network cost.

People are somewhat irritated about the animated avatars that's why there's a solution made (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5114171.), yet theymos completely disabled it for good, though I don't know the primary reasons but you can check:

I don't know how it was before, but I think that I would be extremely annoyed with everyone wearing those animated avatars. It's one thing seeing an ocassional animated avatar like it is now, but seeing whole thread full of those tacky things is something completely different.

Anyway, good call by theymos and I hope he doesn't change his mind and bring that back.

I do not know if others see it as I am seeing it, that one alone beside the OP post is distracting me from reading, if many members are wearing animated avatar, it will be a distraction, some people still go by disabling avatar and signature, more people will because of this animation thing disable avatar and signature ads because it will be disturbing reading what others are posting, the animation will be appreaing annoying.

Good for you that now almost none of the members wear the animated avatar expect me.  ;) (as it distracts your reading )

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Any idea how many of the forum members are still wearing the animated avatar or i am the only one left  ?

They were disabled in february 2019, as depicted in this thread:  Stop animated images in FireFox / Tor browser / Chrome (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5114171.msg49914868#msg49914868).

Apparently, they were not intended to be allowed, buy PNGs managed to get away with it until the matter was looked into and promptly handled:

They were pretty annoying and distracting when reading (remaining still are ..., but there aren't that many around visually).

You are not alone and there are members who wear animated avatars. Some of them are yahoo62278 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=355846) or Vod (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=30747).

Animated avatar like the one is worn by Vod is not annoying. It is slow and friendly enough. You even don't realize it is an animated avatar if you don't look at it for a few seconds.

I remember very well how the story started about the need to ban animated avatars, and the Stake signature/avatar campaign is to blame for everything, because in addition to a bunch of shit posters, they also had horribly irritating avatars. There is always someone to blame for something, and when someone abuses something, then the only way is a complete ban - luckily, there are not too many old animated avatars, so some have managed to keep them until today. But maybe your question will remind the admin of the possibility of removing them - although it is not certain on his priority list.

I dunno, I kind of like seeing some of the more "animated" avatars were distracting in a good way - there was one of two flies forever walking in circles, then there was an infinity symbol with coloured lines like race tracks or something (you had to see it)  Another one I think is Charles Manson pretending he's mad.  I've seen old gifs that have stuff such as cogs turning , or, a radio tower with stylaised lightning (think the RKO logo).  The choices are endless.

If people say that avatar's are "distracting" simply by being animated - then it begs the question "Why have avatars at all?"  -  The whole point of an avatar is for them to be viewed.  QED.

There are numerous old members of the forum still wearing the animated avatar( very simple and beautiful) unlike your own which is very detrimental in the eyes, don't you think it is high time you change it?

I think there are several old newbies still wearing avatars, today it is impossible; theymos deactivated so many things when he became the administrator.

Damn, I knew that I am not the most perceptive person, but didn't know I suck this much. I've been on the forum for almost two years now, saw Vod avatar God knows how many times and I never realized its actually animated.

/facepalm

Which begs the question "Where is theymos?"  -  You would be better appealing to LoyceV who appears to have taken over ownership of the Forum (case in point - all of the missives that LoyceV has issued as *cough* "suggestions" as to how the members of the Forum should behave.).

The more "changes" theymos makes to the Forum, the less likely an replacement will happen anytime soon.

Man....I've had avatars and signatures disabled for years.  They're two of the things I could never stand about discussion forums in general.  On some other forums I've belonged to, signatures can (and often do) take up more space than a member's post.  There's one forum I used to lurk on where moderation was nowhere near as strict as it is here, and there were tons of "+1", "LOL", and similar one-line crap, over and over, but most of the space was taken up by avatars and signatures.  Drives me up a wall.

That's just me, though.  I get that a lot of people like seeing avatars & sigs, but animated ones?  I think that would drive even the calmest, most tolerant person batty. 

I think he still exists, though I don't have any proof other than the PM I got from his account when I got my sMerit allocation upped a few weeks ago.  Lol.  Makes me wonder if there's any sort of plan in place should he become incapacitated or whatever.  As for where he is at the moment, my guess is that he's sipping margaritas on a nice beach somewhere.

If I remember this right, theymos removed them because they were too distracting. He disabled them right before sig camps starting to go crazy on them. If he didn't, we all would be wearing animated, flashy avatars and the place would look like a Chinese brothel.

It was a good call for our eye health.

Is it right? I think you've provided a great example to illustrate how annoying the forum looks because of animated avatars. Lol

Personally maybe I don't really like using animated avatars as they might have a bit of strain on the eyes. Obviously if all bounty campaign and signature campaign require forum users to use animated avatar then I think there's a lot of time wasted just watching those avatar dance. It seems theymos has made a proper effort to ban animated avatar from growing on the forum.

Whenever I look at a website without Adblock, I'm instantly annoyed by many blinking images. It distracts, and I'm glad it was banned. Many people don't seem to realize how nice a quiet environment is.

Your conspiracies are getting better :D

Just my opinion:

I do not agree in considering all animated avatars to be annoying, just the heavily animated ones.
There are avatars that has very minimal animation (eg. ibminer) , that is very cute and amusing actually.

These emojis have a bit of animation too,

 :o  ::)  :-*  :'(

And they don't seem to be annoying at all.

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Huh, lemme join you.

/facepalm

As quickseller would say:

Actually Nobody is saying all the animated avatar were annoying but at a time the forum was looking like something else and due to this feature been disabled the forum is now quite better. The casino related campaign made it very difficult to concentrate with all the movement ongoing on the left side of the forum especially when you visited the gambling board. I remember many people complaining resulting to theymos making the call to deactivate it. Even the not so annoying ones became annoying when they were numerous in display.

The truth is the forum is quite better this way. Even before the banned there was solutions coming out like; Stop animated images in FireFox / Tor browser / Chrome (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5114171.0) so interesting discussion went on there.

If avatars were still allowed by the forum, campaigns would not want to go for the easy-on-the eys designs, but the heavily animated ones which they believe would attract more attention. You can see this by checking many sites today, which depends on flashy animated designs with blinkering ads.
Disabling animated signatures seems to be the best option to keep the forum sane for viewers.

A perfect example is the one OP is wearing I've never liked it for once wish he could change it, too flashy and annoying at the same time.

OP you need to consider our eyes sights as some of us are too old to have those Chinese new year disco lights in our eyes.  ;D

Set your browser to animate only once (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5114171.0) :)

Looks like the chrome users' configuration is for Desktop only, I'm using a chrome browser on my phone so how do I go about it? Do I need to download firefox browser( not my favorite)

https://i.imgur.com/ceHmYxZ.png

Animated avatars are not bad but those avatars will become annoying if
- They are designed badly, too fast animations that distract our eyes and concentration on the text and discussions that are main elements in the forum. The forum is for idea discussion, not for signature or avatar.
- They are overused by many companies and signature campaign participants.

I don't think theymos will bring animated avatars back but personally I feel good if they have good designs.

I can't tell you. I don't use mobile (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=1903546) that often, but when I do, I have to move/zoom the page to be able to read posts. This moves avatars off the screen.

Lol.. We live on a forum where dead things don't come back alive. Animations are gone for good.

Zoom makes it difficult to have the posts at one glance, I only swipe left and right. I did some dead-end research I think the only way is to grow a Thick Skin.

I don't mind the boob licker at all because it's barely noticeable, but some of the stuff that users wore or that some campaigns had people wear was just too much. I have never spoken out against ads or signatures because I understand that it's a way for the forum to finance its operations. Plus I am wearing a signature and it just seems weird to me to have them disabled while I am benefiting from one myself.

Flashy avatars are really distracting and they draw your focus away from the stuff you write or read. I don't min that they are gone. If everyone used something as simple as the boob licker there wouldn't be a problem with them.     

I didn't know that they have discontinued the usage of the animated avatar since there's the Bitvest avatar that moves. I don't know the reason but if it's the size that they are worried in my opinion because movements in any graphic is going to cost more data to the website.

Those who were already uploaded before theymos made the change remained. If you try adding an animated avatar now, it wouldn't work.

They were too annoying. It looked like a disco on the left side of your screen. Judging by some old posts I found on that topic, you were never supposed to have the ability to upload an animated avatar. Users simple found a loophole that allowed you to upload an APNG, an animated picture if you want. When theymos found out what was going on, he simply put a stop on something that wasn't supposed to be a thing in the first place.   

Yeah, cool and salient representing the avatar text of that user. One would miss it if one didn't pay a three seconds attention to it. It's a pity that the user exited the forum. Whereas OP's avatar is annoyingly distracting to say the least. If they were to bring back animated avatar I think it should be limited to just the legendary rank and it should be avatar type that won't have more than two switches or give us the Vod type - slow one.

Edited:
Imagine having an avatar like that below 👇

I say instead of allowing old members who already had animated avatars to keep them theymos could make a new rank which is only for members who have earned 2500+ merit, have the activity. At least then only the most big members of the forum would have the animated ones which would set them apart from the community more. 

Guess I'm missing something but op's avatar looks animated to me  ???

The quoted message from theymos in post #2 should answer your question.
If it wasn't clear, "grandfathered" means "exempted", and the "old ones" are the already-in-use animated avatars before it was disabled.

It doesn't look animated. It's ANIMATED! Except if you're imagining it isn't 🙄

What makes you think legendary members are the ones who would be interested in having an animated avatar, or more precisely, those with 2.500 and more earned merits?

Let's use this thread as a case study.
If my count is correct, 11 legendary members have posted in this thread so far. Only 4 of them have +2500 merits. Not a single legendary member wears an animated avatar. Not only that, but the thread starter is the only user who has posted in this discussion and has animation in his avatar.

See Vod and ibminer :)
It took me years to notice Vod's avatar is animated, because it's subtle (and my browser only shows it once). I don't think I noticed ibminer's animation until I read about it here.
It's too bad those subtle animations can't be added anymore, just because of overly active signature campaigns.

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A  cycling fox with background animation would be really cool though :D

Wait, what?

I always thought his avatar was non-animated. After all, it shows Peter licking his boob to begin with ;D

Old members can't wear animated avatars, only people who wore animated avatars before the change is wearing it and once they changes it they can't be able to wear the old or new animated avatars.

That is what I mean by old members.

It is a option and does not mean that everyone over that merit has to use a animated avatar but it would still allow using it if you have achieved a lot of merit. Old members having use of it does not make sense because most are inactive today.

That is why they got exception, so users may not affected by new rules and I remember the issue started when campaign started to use flashy avatars which is kind of annoying for the people to read the posts. Maybe in future theymos can remove them completely if he think that existing avatars falls into the annoying category.

Yeah maybe a simple cycler without the background would look better;  something like this looks cool and not disastrous to the eyes, not all those discos light avatar.

https://i.imgur.com/O8ko0Tj.gif

Same goes for BTCforJoe, I thought I was just tripping out or sleepy, then I had to stare at his avatar only to find out that it was indeed animated.
It's funny that he knows that the avatar will be stared at as well. :D
Here is the avatar:
https://i.ibb.co/XLFLgQL/avatar-557989.png

An animated avatar works as an unwritten rule of etiquette that you should not wear a tie with sports shoes, for some people this combination works and even creates a trend, but they are one of those things that does not work for everyone in the trend.

2500 or 1 merits do not guarantee proper use of the corresponding animated avatar for community finesse.  ;)

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... maybe only...:

https://i.imgur.com/bdqn52A.gif

^{Source: Cycling club / edited for post purposes only.}

      I want to laugh a little, I don't know why I feel a little rustic when seeing the animated avatar.

     I  have seen a store investment website that specializes in advertising, all of which are flashing animations, but when I encounter this kind of page, I may close the page in advance.

Animated avatar looks colorful and attractive but it  distracts users from reading the content of a post or spend more hours trying to relate with the information you shared. I rather go with thymos decision to suspend animated avatars so we can focus on getting the information passed

So, the fox now wags its tail 🤔

I found these interesting ones too...

https://i.imgur.com/Rh6bT71.gif
From user becoin (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=20648)

https://i.imgur.com/NsoNbUR.gif
From user Geist (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=96984)

https://i.imgur.com/sdNsfYU.gif
From user giszmo (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=19025)