#no one wants this

[irfrenchfries]

Hi i made u something 😘

"Your microphone's a turkey baster, Ford."

"Oh no, this only looks like a turkey baster. It's really an audio-video-olfactory recorder I obtained in dimension..."

The follow-up:

[femmefeedist]

do you want to cut back eating? Sure?

no I literally do not want to cut back literally zero percent of me wants to eat less or cut back if anything I want more 😭

[bedlamsbard]

me (unhinged) (person who became (at least vaguely) politically aware post-9/11) (also the person who's convinced the events of CACW flipped the 2016 election): we should talk more about how the Snap affects U.S. politics

[isacksteban]

parents!strollini

[moonlight-at-dawn]

Oh. Oh no. Tumblr @staff, NO ONE wants to be sent to For You instead of Following upon entering the site. This is not the kind of thing that most of us would ever be happy about. It's, in many ways, the reason we've stayed here so long, because we liked that you didn't try to force an algorithm on us. I do not want to ever be sent to For You against my will ever again... Leave it as an option for those that want it, but never ever push it....

[ghostoftheyear]

The worst thing about Tumblr possibly (lbr, probably) partnering with Midjourney is that the nature of the platform makes it impossible to protect all my art.

I can download Glaze and Nightshade (which I haven't done yet, shame on me) and get working on all my past art, re-upload to existing posts and protect the art I put up from now on. That's a pain in the ass and would take more time than I'd like, but I could do it.

The problem is, what do I do about art that's been reblogged? That can't be edited or changed. That's gone. Out of my hands. It's incredibly ironic that the art we beg people to reblog will now be vulnerable and there's nothing we can do about it. We can delete the original posts, we can delete whole blogs, but anything that's been reblogged? It's just hanging in the wind. My art will be stolen and used for AI fodder and there isn't one fucking thing I can do about it.

That is the worst part. The functionality of Tumblr is now being used against us, and we can't stop it.

I really loved putting my art on here, but I'm going to have to stop. I can't do anything about what's out there already, but I can make sure that none of my future work gets grabbed.

[yikesaroniandcheese]

Tumblr wants ppl to use live SO BAD they won't even let u remove the icon by snoozing it

[motherofmabari]

Why the fuck is the stupid Tumblr live icon permanently glued to my dashboard now

I snoozed the stupid thing and I do not want it, go AWAY and I mean all of it, not just the stuff up top. I will not click, I will not 'get started with Tumblr live', I have ZERO INTEREST

[asslockpick]

if you make me talk to a bot in order to apply for a job you need to die. now.

[howlingdemon13]

Haha!

Wouldn’t it be so funny and cringe if I did a cover of The Whole Being Dead Thing?

Yeah, I know. Super cringe.

Ha!

…

👀

[tsunflowers]

this zool song thats just about being a toxic abusive boyfriend

[hairscare]

just watched tumblr in real time make it so you can only post if youre on your dashboard. bro what the hell

[haru-n-harkel]

Update on this stupid “Tumblr Live” nonsense.

Just snoozing it no longer works, apparently. I had the ‘feature’ snoozed and it continued to show up when I refreshed my dash. I had to manually go in, turn the snooze ‘off’, and turn it back ‘on’ again to remove them.

Thought people should know.

[omg-i-think-i-like-you]

the only way I would accept this stupid love triangle plotline is if they make it an actual triangle and give us stonathan

[maeljade]

You know why you are doing good? Its not cause some suit wanting more money to buy their 3rd Yacht is making the same stupid fucking decisions as other websites.

The influx of users is cause you fucked up MARGINALLY less then Twitter and Reddit. The move now is to shove any idea about "Algorithms" up the Suits ass and tell them to go fuck themselves instead of ruining another social media.

You don't do shit and you continue growing. You make another stupid fucking decision to appear to more mainstream? To make more profits? To "Turn Tumblr into the next PDF" or similar crack ideas and you get a drop in users.

Here are some suggestions: Stop it with the push notifications for polls. If I want to know its result I will seek it out OR WANT AN OPT-IN PER POLL.

The only good idea in this entire post is #6. You should take 1-5, lube them up and shove them up the ass of whatever money hungry idiot proposed this till it comes out their mouth. Though with how shit these suggestions are I suspect you already have done this, thrice over.

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.

Principle 1: Expand the ways new users can discover and sign up for Tumblr.

Tumblr has a “top of the funnel” issue in converting non-users into engaged logged-in users. We also have not invested in industry standard SEO practices to ensure a robust top of the funnel. The referral traffic that we do get from external sources is dispersed across different pages with inconsistent user experiences, which results in a missed opportunity to convert these users into regular Tumblr users. For example, users from search engines often land on pages within the blog network and blog view—where there isn’t much of a reason to sign up. 

We need to experiment with logged-out tumblr.com to ensure we are capturing the highest potential conversion rate for visitors into sign-ups and log-ins. We might want to explore showing the potential future user the full breadth of content that Tumblr has to offer on our logged-out pages. We want people to be able to easily understand the potential behind Tumblr without having to navigate multiple tabs and pages to figure it out. Our current logged-out explore page does very little to help users understand “what is Tumblr.” which is a missed opportunity to get people excited about joining the site.

Actions & Next Steps

Improving Tumblr’s search engine optimization (SEO) practices to be in line with industry standards.

Experiment with logged out tumblr.com to achieve the highest conversion rate for sign-ups and log-ins, explore ways for visitors to “get” Tumblr and entice them to sign up.

Principle 2: Provide high-quality content with every app launch.

We need to ensure the highest quality user experience by presenting fresh and relevant content tailored to the user’s diverse interests during each session. If the user has a bad content experience, the fault lies with the product.

The default position should always be that the user does not know how to navigate the application. Additionally, we need to ensure that when people search for content related to their interests, it is easily accessible without any confusing limitations or unexpected roadblocks in their journey.

Being a 15-year-old brand is tough because the brand carries the baggage of a person’s preconceived impressions of Tumblr. On average, a user only sees 25 posts per session, so the first 25 posts have to convey the value of Tumblr: it is a vibrant community with lots of untapped potential. We never want to leave the user believing that Tumblr is a place that is stale and not relevant. 

Actions & Next Steps

Deliver great content each time the app is opened.

Make it easier for users to understand where the vibrant communities on Tumblr are. 

Improve our algorithmic ranking capabilities across all feeds. 

Principle 3: Facilitate easier user participation in conversations.

Part of Tumblr’s charm lies in its capacity to showcase the evolution of conversations and the clever remarks found within reblog chains and replies. Engaging in these discussions should be enjoyable and effortless.

Unfortunately, the current way that conversations work on Tumblr across replies and reblogs is confusing for new users. The limitations around engaging with individual reblogs, replies only applying to the original post, and the inability to easily follow threaded conversations make it difficult for users to join the conversation.

Actions & Next Steps

Address the confusion within replies and reblogs.

Improve the conversational posting features around replies and reblogs. 

Allow engagements on individual replies and reblogs.

Make it easier for users to follow the various conversation paths within a reblog thread. 

Remove clutter in the conversation by collapsing reblog threads. 

Explore the feasibility of removing duplicate reblogs within a user’s Following feed. 

Principle 4: Retain and grow our creator base.

Creators are essential to the Tumblr community. However, we haven’t always had a consistent and coordinated effort around retaining, nurturing, and growing our creator base.  

Being a new creator on Tumblr can be intimidating, with a high likelihood of leaving or disappointment upon sharing creations without receiving engagement or feedback. We need to ensure that we have the expected creator tools and foster the rewarding feedback loops that keep creators around and enable them to thrive.

The lack of feedback stems from the outdated decision to only show content from followed blogs on the main dashboard feed (“Following”), perpetuating a cycle where popular blogs continue to gain more visibility at the expense of helping new creators. To address this, we need to prioritize supporting and nurturing the growth of new creators on the platform.

It is also imperative that creators, like everyone on Tumblr, feel safe and in control of their experience. Whether it be an ask from the community or engagement on a post, being successful on Tumblr should never feel like a punishing experience.

Actions & Next Steps

Get creators’ new content in front of people who are interested in it. 

Improve the feedback loop for creators, incentivizing them to continue posting.

Build mechanisms to protect creators from being spammed by notifications when they go viral.

Expand ways to co-create content, such as by adding the capability to embed Tumblr links in posts.

Principle 5: Create patterns that encourage users to keep returning to Tumblr.

Push notifications and emails are essential tools to increase user engagement, improve user retention, and facilitate content discovery. Our strategy of reaching out to you, the user, should be well-coordinated across product, commercial, and marketing teams.

Our messaging strategy needs to be personalized and adapt to a user’s shifting interests. Our messages should keep users in the know on the latest activity in their community, as well as keeping Tumblr top of mind as the place to go for witty takes and remixes of the latest shows and real-life events.  

Most importantly, our messages should be thoughtful and should never come across as spammy.  

Actions & Next Steps

Conduct an audit of our messaging strategy.

Address the issue of notifications getting too noisy; throttle, collapse or mute notifications where necessary.  

Identify opportunities for personalization within our email messages. 

Test what the right daily push notification limit is. 

Send emails when a user has push notifications switched off.

Principle 6: Performance, stability and quality.

The stability and performance of our mobile apps have declined. There is a large backlog of production issues, with more bugs created than resolved over the last 300 days. If this continues, roughly one new unresolved production issue will be created every two days. Apps and backend systems that work well and don't crash are the foundation of a great Tumblr experience. Improving performance, stability, and quality will help us achieve sustainable operations for Tumblr.

Improve performance and stability: deliver crash-free, responsive, and fast-loading apps on Android, iOS, and web.

Improve quality: deliver the highest quality Tumblr experience to our users. 

Move faster: provide APIs and services to unblock core product initiatives and launch new features coming out of Labs.

Conclusion

Our mission has always been to empower the world’s creators. We are wholly committed to ensuring Tumblr evolves in a way that supports our current users while improving areas that attract new creators, artists, and users. You deserve a digital home that works for you. You deserve the best tools and features to connect with your communities on a platform that prioritizes the easy discoverability of high-quality content. This is an invigorating time for Tumblr, and we couldn’t be more excited about our current strategy.