By banning screenshots, Quibi is doing its best to stop users from talking about Quibi shows at all

Vulture

Earlier this week, a Twitter user went viral with more than 1 million views by using one phone to film another phone showing Rachel Brosnahan with a golden arm from Sam Raimi's Quibi series 50 States of Fright. He had to use two phones because Quibi makes it difficult for its content to be shared and spread by social media. As Kathryn VanArendonk points out, "Quibi’s shows are perfect for stupid memes and social sharing," which makes the shortform streaming service's ban all the more perplexing. "Screenshots, memes, GIFs, and other small excerpts are essentially forms of quotation," says VanArendonk. "They act as shareable pieces of larger works, sometimes with the goal of illuminating the work they come from, but often getting cut away from their original contexts, sent out into the world to stand on their own and gather their own meanings. GIFs are the most common out-of-context excerpts of longer video works, so expressive and self-sufficient that they can communicate an idea without carrying along any of their original framework. Screenshots can function the same way, often speaking more toward the context in which they’re being deployed than referencing the original work. They become their own form of language, but as they circulate and accrete new meanings, they also make the images, reactions, stories, and personalities from the original work more familiar, more of a bedrock part of cultural discourse. Carole Baskin’s 'Hey all you cool cats and kittens!' line quickly became a reference to Tiger King, for instance, but it’s also accrued its own implications separate from the show — it’s a weird greeting, an awkwardly mannered way to start speaking, a intro with just a touch of self-awareness and also not nearly enough social awareness...It’s still early for Quibi, and it’s too soon to know whether its billion-dollar bet on mobile-only video will pay off. But not being able to screenshot any of it makes the entire platform feel immediately less relevant and less interesting for the cultural conversation. Standing out among the crowd of video content is the whole ball game for new platforms. As my colleague Megh Wright put it, 'If I can’t screenshot a show, does it even exist?'" ALSO: Quibi has tumbled out of Apple's Top 50 free app download chart.