Behold, Frinkiac, which takes Simpsons quotes as input and returns the corresponding screencap. I’d echo John Siracusa on this:
A towering achievement: https://t.co/hfgkMSGIjY (via @Schrockwell)
Example: https://t.co/jczrrcK5uS
— John Siracusa (@siracusa) February 3, 2016
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“Towering achievement” indeed.[1] I quickly found Sideshow Bob’s H.M.S. Pinafore performance using the line “He himself has said it.” Want to see Ralph Wiggum deliver his “That’s where I’m a Viking!” line? No problem. Or Homer’s expression while listening to the National Fatherhood Institute’s hold music? Easy. I could spend all day exhausting the Simpsons quotes that repeat viewings burned into my teenaged brain.
If I ran Fox, I’d buy Frinkiac and build its functionality into simpsonsworld.com. Imagine: what if searching for your favorite quote summoned not just the screencap—but the actual video clip? Once you had found your scene, the site would let you embed it elsewhere on the web—or generate an animated GIF (with subtitles) to share on social media. Boom: infinite pageviews.
Matt Hauger 