I’d like to propose a small but powerful usability upgrade for GoatMatrix submissions: allow direct clipboard paste of images into the submission box.
Why?
Right now, adding images often involves:
- Saving the image from another site.
- Uploading it manually.
- Generating and pasting a link.
This takes time and has historically triggered unnecessary infighting over which image host is “acceptable.” With clipboard paste, you could skip all of that and just drop an image straight into your post.
Why it’s viable now
- We already have gvid.tv as a reliable upload repository made by x0x7, and the submission form already supports uploading images there.
- Adding paste-to-upload would simply automate that existing flow instead of relying on external platforms.
How it might work (high level)
- Frontend (JavaScript)
- Detect paste events on the submission box.
- Check for image data in the clipboard.
- Upload the image to gvid.tv automatically in the background.
- Insert the resulting gvid.tv link or markdown into the submission.
- Backend
- No major changes, since gvid.tv already handles hosting.
- Just ensure proper rate limits and size limits (2–5MB cap?).
- User Experience
- Paste image → see a preview → post as usual.
- Removes friction, speeds up posting, and avoids broken third-party links.
This small feature would make it easier for power posters (like myself) who do big news roundups and don’t want to spend time hopping across the web for image links. It also solves the “what image host is allowed” argument once and for all because everything is kept in-house.
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Yep. It's not a bad idea. A sibling idea is having a file form element. I'll add both to my todo. Heads up that my todo is a combo of 1 part probabilistic and 2 parts prioritizing. If it happens it happens. Not a bad idea in either case.
Though it does have me curious. In theory the image is somewhere on the web. Chances are that source is good enough and you could use it or hit the re-upload check box.
I ask because it relates to a curiosity I've had for a while on how so many degraded mp4s end up on catbox in a re-encoded format often with a bad codec choice. Obviously the clip lived somewhere before hitting catbox. So instead of that link getting shared around someone downloaded it, transcoded it for some unknown reason, and uploaded it.
It just reminds me of something I've seen my father do where he's constantly needing to print things and scan things and wondering how he can work with the text of something he scanned 🤦