We have to admit it: there is so much that we, as simple users, do not know about how Facebook works. So sometimes, users come across funny and/or weird things on the social network and share them with everyone else.
For example… Did you know that Facebook automatically generates an ASCII art version of your photos? You didn’t, right? Well neither did we. Until now.
Also Read: Facebook Is Ready To Rollout Reactions To All Users
This awesome, but unknown, trick is accessible to everyone. All you have to do is grab the link to an image you have uploaded on Facebook by right clicking on it and then choose ‘copy image URL’. Paste that URL into your browser, then simply add ‘.html’ at the end. Et voilà!
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You have seen the coloured ASCII art above, it was generated from the original photo of my dog, Ektoras:
Doing this will give you a full coloured ASCII art version of your photo. It works for almost every photo you have uploaded onto Facebook or shared on the platform via Instagram. Photos will need to be public, otherwise it won’t work (public images url usually end with ‘.jpg’ – if the pic you selected does not, just try another image).
Oh and if you’re more into black and white art, add ‘.txt’ instead of ‘.html’ at the end of the URL.
This is not an official feature of course, so there is no official Facebook statement as to why this is happening. However, I think it could well be linked to an experiment Facebook is conducting which aims to allow blind people to ‘see’ images in the future.
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Anyway, for now it is an awesome trick that will allow you to create cool ASCII artwork in just a few minutes! It was discovered by Mathias Bynens who immediately shared it on Twitter:
Take any Facebook/Instagram photo URL.
👉 append `.txt` → ASCII art
👉 append `.html` → colored ASCII art— Mathias Bynens (@mathias) January 28, 2016
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