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Animated GIFs -- short sequences of images that act like tiny moving pictures -- have been around since Netscape Navigator 2.0 (!), but thanks to sites like Facebook, Twitter, and particularly Tumblr, these little slices of Internet hilarity have exploded in recent years. By this point, even your mom knows what they are (see Jennifer Lawrence at the 2013 Oscars for a major mainstream-media example), but it's not too late for you to get in on the craze. One of the best things about animated GIFs is that they're easy to make, especially with tools like Any GIF … Read more

Leaked from today's 404 episode:

- "Friendzone" added to Oxford dictionary.

- Makerlove is an online community of 3D-printed adult toys.

- New app turns your iPhone into a mobile urine lab.

- It was bound to happen: Dongiverse lets you print 3D sex toys.

- Boston frat starts Indiegogo campaign for transsexual brother.

- Oleg Berg's YouTube and Soundcloud pages rework the keys of classic songs, for better or worse. Exhibit the creepiness of "Hey Jude" in minor.… Read more

An ambitious developer, Esten Hurtle, has developed a way to quickly turn any Vine video into an animated GIF using a very simple Mac app. The app, VineGifR, is free and available to download by following the download link in the ReadMe section on Esten's Github page. It's a good idea to follow this page for further app updates as development continues. As you'll see below, the current version of the app is very basic.

Originally covered by Mashable, Esten posted the app on Hacker News asking for feedback.

The first time you launch the app on … Read more

To GIF or not to GIF. That is the question for many Internet denizens these days, especially if they frequent Tumblr or Reddit. At the moment, it's the easiest way to share a quick animation, thanks in part to its compatibility with nearly every Internet browser ever made.

As the GIF (graphic interchange format) turns 25 this year, what better way to celebrate -- aside from GIFing it -- than Oxford American Dictionaries announcing that the acronym has been named 2012's "Word of the Year. … Read more

The show title isn't just an SEO play, we actually have five copies of Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 to give away on the system of your choice (Wii U, Xbox 360, or PS3). Just follow us on Twitter and tell us your best 404-related box art parody name--use this one as an example, and don't forget to use the hash tag #404COD!… Read more

Leaked from today's 404 episode:

- Instagram 3.0 adds infinite scrolling, lets you plot on a Photo map.

- How to control which Instagram pics show up on your Photo Map.

- Hipstamatic lays off all but six employees.

- Hipstamatic becomes the first third-party app to officially post photos to Instagram.

- Buzzfeed invites you to rub Ryan Gosling. Learn the Moonwalk from MJ too, while you're at it.

- From a visual perspective, RubGifs still don't compare to cinemagraphs.

- Google US map shows regional stereotypes by autocompleting "Why is ____ so..."… Read more

A few days ago, CNET photographer Josh Miller was going around the office making Cinemagrams. I had seen the app before on the iTunes App Store most-popular lists, but had assumed it was simply a version of Instagram for video. When Josh showed me how the app worked, I was really impressed.

After seeing what Cinemagram could do (more about that below), I started wondering about other animation apps in the App Store and came upon several that were impressive for different reasons, but popular for the interesting animations you could make with your iPhone.

This week's collection of apps is all about making short animations. The first makes stop-motion animations by taking several photos of a moving object. The second makes short videos into animated GIFs you can add to text messages. The third is Cinemagram, an app that lets you make photo and video hybrids that are simple and fascinating.… Read more

Some readers may remember the flickering, old-timey, surprisingly three-dimensional GIFs that made a splash on the Internet back in 2008. Writer and artist Joshua Heineman created them from images of 19th and early 20th century stereoscope cards he culled from a collection placed online by the New York Public Library.

Heineman took the two slightly offset images on a given card, separated them, dropped them into Photoshop, and created animated GIFs that quickly "flipped" from one image to the other, over and over (a technique known as "wiggle stereoscopy").

Then, as part of a personal project called "Reaching for the Out of Reach," he posted the GIFs on his Tumblr blog, where they were discovered by the blogosphere and spread far and wide.

Now--thanks to that online fame, and to the New York Public Library's push to reinvent itself in the Internet Age--you too can breathe new three-dimensional life into these stereoscopic artifacts.… Read more

Sharing movies while mobile can be fun, but generally will eat a lot of your monthly bandwidth allowance.

Instead of sharing the entire movie while you're out, why not share a quick animated GIF instead? With GIFDroid for Android, you can take a new or existing video and turn it into an animated GIF that you can send off in seconds to a friend or family member.

First you'll need to install GIFDroid from the Android Market, then open the app.

Step 1: Press either the Select Video or Record Video button. Select … Read more