Animations in Posts

[Aspergirl4hire]

Does the ban on animations in signatures also apply to avatars? I'm asking because there are two animated avatars that I'm aware of. I didn't have a problem with the first one because it was so rare.

It is hard to read something while things are moving on the page. It's not like it's embedded video that I can stop; it permanently disrupts the visual field.

Alternative suggestion: can the Ignore function be expanded such that if I ignore a member, I not only do not see their content, but I also do not see their avatar? That would also fix the problem, for me, if my sensitivity to visual fields is just too "active."

Thank you for reading my post.

 

[King_Oni]

The reason we initially implemented the rule on not allowing animated signatures was because it was distracting. The same can be said about avatars though. Yet, the first time we saw someone with an animated avatar it wasn't distracting, which means we haven't considered spreading this rule further.

But I do agree and see how an animated image is distracting. We (the staff) could look into it and see if we can either make a rule about it or ask that member in person, since it's a rare thing we see here. Having a rule for those "once in a while" occurences feels a bit silly IMO.

 

[wyverary]

It's generally discouraged, and I can think of a couple of examples where members were asked to change their avatar because it proved too distracting. Especially on a forum such as this, where sensory issues obviously have to be taken into account. That said, it's not against the rules to have an animated avatar...I guess historically it's been taken on a case-by-case basis.

 

[Aspergirl4hire]

It's generally discouraged, and I can think of a couple of examples where members were asked to change their avatar because it proved too distracting. Especially on a forum such as this, where sensory issues obviously have to be taken into account. That said, it's not against the rules to have an animated avatar...I guess historically it's been taken on a case-by-case basis.

That makes sense to me. Fair enough. I'm keeping my peace for now. I did see an impressive and comic example of an animated gif in a post, and it made the point well because it was part of the message. That's not what I was troubled by. I'm more irritated by what looks like gratuitous use. If everybody with ADHD and/or basic animation skills showed it off at once, that would make this a different experience.

 

[zurb]

In case it helps... using the tapatalk app, you don't see any animations unless you tap the image first.

 

[Judge]

It's generally discouraged, and I can think of a couple of examples where members were asked to change their avatar because it proved too distracting. Especially on a forum such as this, where sensory issues obviously have to be taken into account. That said, it's not against the rules to have an animated avatar...I guess historically it's been taken on a case-by-case basis.

Yep. It's a design standard. At least it was when I was in school learning such things. Of course back then animations were not only used sparingly because of the distraction factor, but bandwidth as well.

Not something you want to have especially when there's a high content of text on the page.