I am consuming a media and you are going to hear about it
can you believe that shauna had an affair, killed and dismembered a man, hid the body, lied to the police, got her daughter involved, ran away to a cult, and nearly got hunted to death to be sacrificed to a wilderness god..... because no one wanted to buy jeff's furniture???? 😭😭😭
jesus fucking christ
"i wish i could do something 😔 / i wish the wga had a kickstarter or a gofundme, i would throw money at it" good news! it's amazing how you can literally go onto the wga strike website or the wgawest linktree from their twitter and find links to support writers and other workers affected by the strike
Tumblr’s Core Product Strategy
Here at Tumblr, we’ve been working hard on reorganizing how we work in a bid to gain more users. A larger user base means a more sustainable company, and means we get to stick around and do this thing with you all a bit longer. What follows is the strategy we're using to accomplish the goal of user growth. The @labs group has published a bit already, but this is bigger. We’re publishing it publicly for the first time, in an effort to work more transparently with all of you in the Tumblr community. This strategy provides guidance amid limited resources, allowing our teams to focus on specific key areas to ensure Tumblr’s future.
The Diagnosis
In order for Tumblr to grow, we need to fix the core experience that makes Tumblr a useful place for users. The underlying problem is that Tumblr is not easy to use. Historically, we have expected users to curate their feeds and lean into curating their experience. But this expectation introduces friction to the user experience and only serves a small portion of our audience.
Tumblr’s competitive advantage lies in its unique content and vibrant communities. As the forerunner of internet culture, Tumblr encompasses a wide range of interests, such as entertainment, art, gaming, fandom, fashion, and music. People come to Tumblr to immerse themselves in this culture, making it essential for us to ensure a seamless connection between people and content.
To guarantee Tumblr’s continued success, we’ve got to prioritize fostering that seamless connection between people and content. This involves attracting and retaining new users and creators, nurturing their growth, and encouraging frequent engagement with the platform.
Our Guiding Principles
To enhance Tumblr’s usability, we must address these core guiding principles.
- Expand the ways new users can discover and sign up for Tumblr.
- Provide high-quality content with every app launch.
- Facilitate easier user participation in conversations.
- Retain and grow our creator base.
- Create patterns that encourage users to keep returning to Tumblr.
- Improve the platform’s performance, stability, and quality.
Below is a deep dive into each of these principles.
@staff You've apparently since walked a lot of the above back, but I'm going to go ahead and give you a cheat sheet for what arguments to give to whoever is handing down these analyses and options.
Specifically, here are some ways to address the "Tumblr is not easy to use" issue and meet your core guiding principles without destroying what your user base has consistently identified as the reasons they stay on Tumblr.
The tl;dr?
Fix your tag and text searches, and learn to live with being a blogging platform.
More specifically:
Principle 1 refers to the inconsistent experience of potential new users when coming to a blog from a single referred post.
Why this is happening: Because you are conflating the platform (tumblr) with the content (people's posts). People are not referred to tumblr-- they are referred to a post on someone's blog which is hosted on tumblr. At the moment, the next logical step for the referred person is to look at the rest of the blog-- which may (or rather, is likely to be) of inconsistent quality. This is normal and should be accepted as a feature, not a bug.
How to "correct" it without losing your base: On individual post pages, add a ribbon/header (these already exist when logged in, but not necessarily when logged out). Add a button to that ribbon labeled "More Like This". Make it a bright color if you want.
Currently, when not logged in, the only header button is "log in" and the aforementioned weak search functionality. Add the "More Like This" button rather than locking blog content from potential new users.
This can also be done on web-facing blogs -- currently my tumblr has no ribbon at all, but it absolutely could:
If any user (new or established!) clicks on the "More Like This" button, have it go to a search that matches the same or similar tags and text.
If you want to get fancy, include the username itself and that user's highest-note posts. And if you want to get extra special bonus fancy, include highest-note posts from the people that user follows.
On that new "More Like This" page, allow your potential new user to highlight a selection of posts that they like.
Then, if this person is not logged in, after some number of highlighted posts assume that this is a potential new user, and offer to "build" a blog for them with these posts queued.
If they agree, ask if they'd like tumblr to walk them through the various basic options to get them started (blog title, avatar/icon, theme colors), and ask if they'd like to follow the tumblrs that they've already reblogged from. Give lots of options. Teach them how to use the site by teaching them how to use the site.
And if they're already users? Then hey! A new avenue for fun and fast reblogging. All at the cost of a ribbon you already have, and a functioning search.
Want more? For once I'm actually going to use the cut-tag so if you want, you can
"What makes tumblr good is the authenticity and freedom of its users to post for their own benefit and to their own interests, rather than chasing an ultimately artificial 'relatable content.'
"Creativity is an iterative process; if you really want to support the creative people on your platform, you must recognize that everyone is creative, and that art needs room to breathe and be bad."
-- tumblr user @triflesandparsnips in the post above, simultaneously handing @staff an improved strategy document, a perfect summary of what works about tumblr, and a manifesto on art and creativity.
FUCK YOU IF SOMEONE I FOLLOW WANTS TO REBLOG A POST 20 TIMES THEN I WANT TO SEE IT ON MY DASH 20 TIMES FUCK YOU TUMBLR FUCK YOU
how does tumblr even work do you just like talk to yourself until people are like "i like this one"
this is actually exactly how it works
me, posting stuff for over 7 different fandoms at random all on the same blog:
ALTWell. That’s the end of that.
not to sound like a victorian woman suffering from hysteria but i do think going to the sea would fix me