I’ve seen a decent amount of bewilderment as to why Facebook would spend $400, 000 on an acquisition of GIPHY.
Honestly, I find it surprising that so many people would be confused by this because truthfully, it’s a brilliant strategic move.
To understand why, one only needs to look at all the ‘Like’ and ‘Share’ buttons that litter the web currently.
Even when you’re not using Facebook, every ‘Like’ and ‘Share’ button on the web uses browser cookies, IP addresses, and a host of other methods to track your behavior. These embedded pixels monitor almost your entire browsing experience and report it back to Facebook, who then uses it to profile you to better target ads at you.
But as Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg himself has pointed out:
“I believe the future is private,”
https://www.wired.com/story/f8-zuckerberg-future-is-private/
This is remarkably prescient and brilliant positioning. Because from a PR perspective, it makes it seem like Facebook is moving towards caring about privacy, when that is not really what he means at all.
In the last few years, we have seen the rise of tools like Slack and Discord to communicate and organize. These are perceived as “private” communities to users. And they represent a challenge for Facebook because our behavior in them is cut off from their data mining.
For Zuckerberg, “the future is private” is a challenge the company faces, not a business opportunity. Facebook’s continued growth requires a way to peer into our private communities.
So how do you find a way to track things that go on inside those walled gardens?
Same way you would the web: Tracking pixels.
And who has a large market share of image files embedded in closed chat conversations and “private” communities?
GIPHY.