Restrictions spur creativity. Perception shapes reality. Or why you don't want to get on the wrong side of your users.
In the early days of the internet, GIF was the prevailing file format for website graphics. While JPEG is great for compressing photos, GIF (Graphical Image File) is a lossless encoding that works great when an image has solid areas of colour.
There was just one issue with GIF (and not the animated gifs that together with marquee texts made early websites painful to browse). The algorithm to encode GIF files was proprietary. Everyone who wanted to provide tools for creating and reading GIF files would need to pay a fee.
In 1994 a group of people came up with an alternative format, the PNG (Portable Network Graphics) format that we use today. PNG is an improved, non-patented replacement for GIF. PNG files are typically smaller than GIF and the format allows for a wider range of colour depths as well as transparency options.
Unofficially, the initials PNG stood for the recursive acronym "PNG's not GIF”.
While the patents for the for the proprietary compression used for GIF has long expired, PNG has won the internet.
“Unisys was subjected to thousands of online attacks and abusive emails from users believing that they were going to be charged $5000 or sued for using GIFs on their websites. Despite giving free licenses to hundreds of non-profit organizations, schools and governments, Unisys was unable to generate any good publicity and continued to be condemned by individuals and organizations.”
Don't get on the wrong side of your users. Read more about PNG, GIF and the patent enforcement controversy on Wikipedia.
Creating a better world
I find the history of innovation fascinating, the path from invention to widespread adaptation of a new technology. From phones and computers to bikes, cars, and electricity. Fridges and airplanes. Railway gauges and gasoline pumps. Where would international shipping be today without containers and pallets?
It’s not just about coming up with something that works technically. It’s also about getting the technology into the hands of users, applications, and coming up with a viable business for continue to deliver and support the product or service. Often fighting outdated legislation and existing norms for decades before getting there.
We often give much credit to the initial inventors, the pioneers, while they are rarely the ones profiting financially from their work. We give too little credit to those who enhances the technology and builds a viable business based on the invention. Putting in all the hard work to mature the technology. Believing in a better — or at least different — world.
Places to visit near Stockholm for more about the inventions that created the world we live in today:
- Tumba Paper Mill Museum: How money is made
- Vinterviken: Nobel's dynamite factory
- Ågestaverket and the National Museum of Science and Technology: Sweden’s nuclear history
Didn’t know that. 👍🏻
Me neither until recently 🙂