--- title: Gorilla Looks at Pictures of Other Gorillas on Smartphone description: Jelani is all about the smartphone canonical: https://time.com/4026722/gorilla-pictures-smartphone-jelani/ author: Megan McCluskey article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-09-09T18:29:40.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:24:28.021Z og:title: This Gorilla Is Completely Mesmerized by Pictures of Other Gorillas og:description: Jelani is all about the smartphone og:url: https://time.com/4026722/gorilla-pictures-smartphone-jelani/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: This Gorilla Is Completely Mesmerized by Pictures of Other Gorillas twitter:description: Jelani is all about the smartphone twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # This Gorilla Is Completely Mesmerized by Pictures of Other Gorillas  by [Megan McCluskey](/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Sep 9, 2015 6:29 PM CUT  by [Megan McCluskey](/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Sep 9, 2015 6:29 PM CUT Humans aren’t the only ones who are fascinated by smartphone technology. A video of a zoo-goer entrancing a gorilla with pictures of other gorillas on his phone is going viral. When a young man showed his phone to Jelani, a Western Lowland Gorilla housed at the Louisville Zoo in Kentucky, the animal was mesmerized by pictures of his fellow primates. The gorilla even sat down and settled in on the opposite side of the glass as the visitor continued to scroll through photos. But while guests couldn’t take their eyes off the tech-savvy great ape, his captivation wasn’t necessarily a surprise to zookeepers. “He is a laid-back individual and likes to look at cellphone photos and videos,” Jelani’s bio on the Louisville Zoo’s [website](http://louisvillezoo.org/gorilla-forest/meet-the-gorillas/ "undefined") reads. Turns out gorillas like to spend their free time just like the rest of us: ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4026722/gorilla-pictures-smartphone-jelani/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4026722/gorilla-pictures-smartphone-jelani/"},"headline":"This Gorilla Is Completely Mesmerized by Pictures of Other Gorillas","datePublished":"2015-09-09T18:29:40.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:24:28.021Z","description":"Jelani is all about the smartphone","url":"https://time.com/4026722/gorilla-pictures-smartphone-jelani/","keywords":["Newsfeed","animals"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Megan McCluskey","jobTitle":"Staff Writer","url":"https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4026722/gorilla-pictures-smartphone-jelani/","name":"This Gorilla Is Completely Mesmerized by Pictures of Other Gorillas"}}]}] ```