Facebook and Instagram automatically turn many public photos into ASCII art just by adding a file extension to the end of the web link - ".html" if you want a color image, or ".txt" if you'd prefer it in black and white, Engadget reports citing web standards enthusiast Mathias Bynens.

Trying the feature, Engadget suggests the results have a great lo-fi vibe that could work well for a Facebook background image or even a poster.

As to why Facebook is doing this is not clear yet. This could be for some as yet unknown app or service, or it could just be engineers having fun with code.