One giant leap for government memes

No agency has taken to social media quite as enthusiastically as NASA has. The space agency has built audiences numbering in the millions on Twitter, YouTube and other platforms. Back in 2009, NASA even launched its own internal social network. And now NASA is expanding into the new frontier of ... animated GIFs. 

The official NASA channel on Giphy debuted last week, and currently boasts more than 450 image loops of astronauts, spacecraft, artists' renderings and high-fiving ground control staff. (Many of the images have appeared previously on the agency's Tumblr page and elsewhere.) As the announcement noted, users "can download and share the agency’s creations on their own social media accounts, and can be used to create or share animated GIFs to communicate a reaction, offer a visual explanation, or even create digital works of art."

The Pinterest presence is larger, with nearly 800 images organized into 60 different "boards." For the most part, however, those images are unanimated.