Quibi brags that its new screenshot tool evades DRM for the memes
Quibi, the short-form video streaming service, has added a new screenshot tool to its app that addresses one big criticism of the new platform. The service launched back in early April with apps for Android and iOS, but soon found itself scrambling to releasing a way to watch the service on TVs, too. Users had pointed out that it was difficult to share interesting moments from the shows due to the inability to use screen capture with the app.
As you likely already know, many video apps block a phone's built-in screen-capturing tool, resulting in either a warning that a screenshot can't be taken or a screenshot that features a blank screen. This was the issue when attempting to capture content from Quibi, something Quibi's Tom Conrad says was due to DRM restrictions.
In a series of snarky tweets, Conrad announced that the Quibi app now features a baked-in screenshot tool that can be accessed by long-pressing on a video while it plays. "It's not your grandfather's screenshotting," Conrad said, explaining that users can screenshot content by pressing to open the menu, then sliding down to the new option called 'Slide over to screenshot.'
Is it to encourage 1000 think-pieces about how we dOn't knoW wHAt we'Re DoINg? No, that's just a bonus. ๐คจ It's that products live with constraints & in this case we have to honor the DRM preferred by our content creators while satisfying your desire to meme-ify @joejonas. 4/6
โ Tom Conrad (@tconrad) July 23, 2020
The screenshot feature is available in Quibi app version 1.7, but Conrad notes that it's basically a beta feature at this point because the engineers are still tweaking its functionality. The tool can't capture captions on the videos at this time, but it is available for users to try if they're interested โ just be warned that there's 'a tiny number of' episodes in which screenshots are still blocked.
At the heart of it all is one goal: giving users the ability to easily create memes from Quibi content. This fan-made material is a great way to get free advertising for the service, which many are still skeptical of. Though younger audiences increasingly watch video content on their phones, it's unclear whether Quibi's short-form shows will catch on in a big way.