#i'm fully aware that this is a “betamax vs vhs” situation but still

[grzzlwmpf]

What does your blog title mean? Genuine question as someone who cares about file types, especially as a graphic designer.

Imo, feature-wise, WebP is the single best image format currently available ((and in widespread use, I think in my ideal world JPEG XL would reign supreme)). It can do both lossy and lossless encoding, animation, transparancy, etc., and on top of it all it's an open format ((so yes, while Google made it and is pushing it pretty hard, it's entirely free for anyone to use and implement, without paying anyone anything)).

But it's also a format people love to hate, and I absolutely get why. Basically all browsers can handle it no problem and it's been specifically designed with web applications in mind ((and again, there's a big push from Google)), so virtually all websites nowadays, tumblr included, just convert all uploaded images to WebP. However, the mainstream support on anything that isn't a browser just isn't quite there yet – hell, even Discord can't deal with animated WebP last time I checked! – especially when it comes to art programs. And so you end up with a file format that's everywhere while people don't really have the tools to do anything with it.

But I still always get a bit mad when people then proceed to shit on WebP itself, rather than the fact that it's not supported more. It's a good format – all the advantages of jpg, png, and gif rolled into a single container! – but without wider native supoort by programs and operating systems I fear we'll be stuck in this situation for a good while longer