#sorry I'm not often salty or into discourse

[myriadebleue]

“If the user has a bad content experience, the fault lies with the product.”

(wtf no???? that's such a sad way to see things... if somebody doesn’t know how to drive a car, that’s not the fault of the fricking car??? the driver just has to make an effort and learn? you know, something humans do constantly???)

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.

[theboarsbride]

bro I love clowning on BookTok and how silly stupid BookTok books and trends and tropes are, but I am sick and tired of this 'all BookTok is is porn' discourse.

Like it just reminds me of Twilight discourse, and it stinks of misogyny. Just let people read what they want??? It's not that hard to find a book YOU want to read and look the other way? It's not that hard to engage with BookTok content that can cater your FYP to YOUR book tastes? Also just stop demonizing porn/sex work and those that use those services? Because unless it's depicting something genuinely harmful/hateful/etc. then what does it matter? BookTok critics need to give readers more credit, tbh, because more often than not I feel like adults can differentiate what is real and what is fiction, and can distinguish what is or is not a toxic relationship but still engage with certain material because they like tropes, are exploring kinks, need escapism, etc.?

Like people waste so much time fretting over porn and spice in books. In that time you could have found a dozen more fantasy or sci-fi books that cater to your tastes! As an AroAce person who is discomforted by ideas of sex, I don't engage with smut or spicy books because it's not my cup of tea and I know my personal boundaries. That's it. I just go find books I WANT to read, then! It isn't rocket science! It's ok to not like smut or be uncomfortable with sex scenes/discussions about sex - it's ok! But to go and demonize those who DO like reading that kind of material is hella stupid.

If you really wanna have a discussion about the ick of BookTok then maybe discuss how toxic the publishing industry can be to its authors, especially authors of color, and how it expects authors to work like machines to pump out bestsellers, valuing quantity over quality, or discuss the harm of authors being in review spaces and how this leads to readers facing threats, doxxing, harassment, and then being too scared to share thoughts on books online.

You peeps waste more time worrying about spice and smut when you can just be whimsical and let people enjoy what they wanna enjoy.

Anyways,,,sorry if this is incoherent i'm just feeling VERY salty.

[rafole]

I hope I don't come off as salty but in light of Netflix and this tendency to profile certain players as innocent babies and others as problematic villains I just think we should bear in mind that these male tennis players live in their own millionaire bubbles and most of them don't really care about women's rights in general. For example, I don't know if this didn't have much impact outside of Spain or the Spanish-speaking world, but Rafa Nadal has denied and justified the gender pay gap in a 2019 press conference using a PRETTY sexist discourse. Being one of the most influential tennis players in the world, that certainly won't help solving the many gender inequalities that still exist in tennis. While I don't agree with Rafa, I understand he thinks this way bc of the way he was raised (his uncle Toni has close ties with the Spanish right-wing party [PP]). I'm not trying to tarnish Rafa's reputation, it's not like he'll solve the wage gap anyway, but this is just an example of why we shouldn't put any tennis player on a high moral pedestal. Sorry for the rant! I just felt I had to express this thought

And I agree with you. Yeah its fun to have favs and love and support players at the end of the day I and no one else here knows any of them personally and situations like these are a reminder of that.

I didn’t know the details of the Rafa thing but I’d heard of it before and its a good example of how your fav sports stars will often disappoint you but you don’t have to hate them for stuff like that. I don’t expect me and a 37 yo millionaire to align politically.

I hope I don’t come off as a person who demonizes or babies players like you put it. I don’t hate any of these players for what they said in the press conference I don’t think any of them are evil for their response and I sympathize and can understand that they might have been caught off guard. For example, Fritz, who probably knew he might be asked about it, had a much better answer than Cam and Casper.

When it comes to babying players, I know alot of people do it because they find comfort in them but it’s something I kind of hate too.

Im gonna take this as an opportunity to tell you guys that while I post abt jannik like he’s the greatest thing to walk this earth I don’t really think that😭 and its not normal to think of anyone in that way.

Anyway ty for ur perspective

[vomara]

absolutely love how some of the people reblogging my post about aang’s trauma getting dismissed are the exact types of people doing the dismissing

[artswaps]

I really gotta write 500 fics focused on Keith & Allura where they have an empathetic and supportive friendship to make up for all the fandom drama they were the centre of because of s2 that still crops up every so often, that left people with the impression that they don’t like one another and an aversion to the idea of them being good friends, huh??? I really gotta???? 

Fine!! I’d love to!!!!! Cos I love my favs and I love writin about them!!! So there!

[andramaquynhs]

Hi there! Saw the "these women deserve a better fandom" post w the "or at least a redeemable one" tag in the TOG tag earlier & being nosy but out of touch I wondered what irredeemable thing happened. I reblog a lot of art/edits, but I don't read fic or follow character tags (I liked the comics pre-film & love GPB from L&B, so I'm a general fan w no character favourites) so I think I miss a lot of fandom discourse & drama. Read the "salty" tag, but still couldn't figure out specifics. Thanks! :)

Hello there! Sorry for the late response

Ok so The Old Guard is a film directed by a black woman and led by two women, one black as well. This is no empty leading either, both characters are well developed, aren't sexualized at all and they and their relationship pretty much drive the movie (especially Nile). Most of Tumblr's popular, signature 'why you should watch' and praising posts stated and praised the hell out of all that, yet when you get into fandom you have to light several candles, say the Lord's prayer and a couple of Hail Marys to even hope to encounter content specifically focusing on Andy or Nile (or Quỳnh, but she gets a pass for obvious reasons), while all other content was readily available (even non-TOG blogs share it), organized alphabetically and colour coded. Even in the Andromache The Scythian or Nile Freeman tags. Lots of times they don't even feature in the post or have one line at best!

You said you read no fanfiction or follow character tags, I'm assuming you don't really ship any characters either, but here are some stats of femslash content in AO3, just to give some perspective (remember, we have three main female characters out of a seven people group, two of them leads, two of them in a canonical relationship in the comics and Andy is the main character there. I also know shipping content isn't everything, but it tends to be within that space that most character studies and such take place)

But to the irredeemable bit, there is a glaring disproportion in content and in the little of it there is, the women aren't really treated with as much care and dedication as their peers, especially Andy since Nile's whole character is...easier to understand, more immediate and more palatable. Andy is often reduced to uncaring, extremely gruff and with none of the kindness we saw in the film, fandom pulls details from other sources (comics, bts, features) about the male characters but most don't even know the range of her age, the general region she originates from, the specific language/dialect of the many that compose the 'Scythian language' that she may have spoken (a lot of work, I understand, but I see that level of effort put into the others), the fact that she predates scythians by a lot in the first place, the approximate duration of her relationship with Quỳnh/Noriko, etc. Nile is often subject to babyfication or used as 'listening ear', and a LOT of her content comes in relation to Booker because of the Book of Nile ship, but admittedly she gets a better treatment from what I can see.

Much of what happens with Andy happens with Quỳnh as well, with the added bonus that she had an villain role in the comics and will obviously have it in the movie sequel. I don't know the specifics because I haven't read them, nor do I feel like I will particularly enjoy them, but fandom tends to take the comics version of Quỳnh and roll with that to make her The Villain in most content (which is already a very small percentage), usually with zero (0) depth and used barely as a plot device for the other characters. Her relationship with Andy takes a backseat, is painted in a very poor light, is used as a point of comparison to the other relationships (to make them look better), is used to remark (and as a fic storyline) that if another character were in her place in the iron maiden, things would've unfolded differently (i.e. better). Even then, taking her comics version because we had so little to work with in the movie, would be ok if people took the same care with it as the others/took the comics version for everyone. Past problematic behaviours like Nicky having been a crusader (mostly) and Nile in the military have been discussed and explored and 'redeemed' over and over, but Quỳnh doesn't get the same treatment. She's usually a one note crazy villain bent on taking revenge, sometimes not even because of what happened to her but on behalf of Booker's 'unjust' exile and using extreme bloody measures. GPB didn’t want the movie to be gratuitously violent, that's one of the things that pulled me in, and I love watching women fuck shit up but when it's only them, when it's the only characteristic attributed to them, it gets trying pretty quickly.

Damn, I did end up ranting, but the point is fandom doesn't give the women, especially Quỳnh and Quỳnh as a villain, the amount of content and layers and depth and growth and background and exploration and analysis they deserve, that they do give the others. I think some of Noriko's reasoning is very sound and the moral implications of her 'villainess', that she may be going the wrong way about things but is ultimately right/doing it for the right reasons, would make for an interesting story, but most of fandom has proven they either don't care or can't be bothered to explore that, so yeah, I wish they were all in a better fandom.

[chimpukampu]

Haha thank you. I'm not too worried about the shipping wars and stuff because I was in the supernatural fandom for...damn it's been like 8 years so I know how it gets but I started watching ml as a happy, not super dramatic and easy to watch show and it was very jarring to just find others saw the opposite in it. But the recommendations helped a lot and I feel like my dash is going to be less like the dead sea 😂😂

Ngl ML fandom is a bit tamer compare to other fandoms that I've been before, though I'm not sure how these salty trends will affect the fans in the long run.

I mean, one of my friends quit ML because this guy she befriended here, who often got compared to Luka (coz he's a guitarist), have been messaging her that he must "save" her from her husband. What creeped me out was how he imagined her as Marinette and her husband as Adrien.

Knowing this, and the panic attacks that happened to my other friend, made me feel scared and sorry for those fans who are too deep into the salt discourse.

[thiswaycomessomethingwicked]

This was my first pride month on tumblr. I'm eighteen but a late bloomer and from a pretty shithole part of my country so I didn't know shit.I'm asexual and I mean, Jesus Christ, the amount of acephobia I've come across in the lgbt community is...I dont know really. Dissapointing? Surprising? Downright crushing? It's not like we have a problem with others sucking face beside us. But we do have a problem with them saying our faces need to be sucked too, you know, to be normal. (Cont'd)

(Same ace anon) And I dont even understand why a actively persecuted group would do the same thing they have been facing for years to another group. This is pretty much the same Straight™ people have been doing. Real life people are not much better either. And it’s so painful and humiliating and CONFUSING. God this moral and sexual policing I’ve faced is mortifying.

Hey happy Pride month. So I’m not going to get too deep into this because I try to avoid the Discourse on here as much as possible. So I’m going to do a quick rundown of a response. 

1) I’m sorry you’re stuck in a shite part of your country. That is very hard for anyone. Absolutely difficult, especially when you’re coming into your own and figuring your stuff out. The expectations of how you perform gender and sexuality can be frustrating and stiffling when you’re in a very close and suffocating place. I feel for you and hope you either get out of there or find your people to be with. That’s never easy. I’m sorry no one is hearing you. 

I spent a good many years in small town Florida so I understand.  

2) Pride in real life can be a very different from pride on tumblr. In real life, in my experience, there is less antagonism, less drama, less pointless discourse about weird things. There’s more conversation around structural issues in society that allow inequality to perpetuate. Lots of rainbows. Bad sunburns. Hawaiin shirts. Small glittery shorts. Grass roots politics. And a general acceptance of anyone who shows up and says they belong. 

I 100% have felt far more policed and gate-kept about everything on this website than I have ever felt either at pride or in, at least my city’s, queer community in general. 

Generally, at pride in real life, you show up for a good time, say you belong, and are there to love and support your community, and aren’t being rude, then you are welcomed with open arms. No one sits there with a check list like “ok but how rainbow coloured do you bleed? Is your hair made of glitter?” 

3) I sympathise with feeling pressure to act and behave in a way that isn’t who you are or how you identify. That absolutely sucks. No one should feel forced to behave in a way that isn’t true to who they are.

That said, I’m going to do an aside for a moment about language and experience: people being a dick to ace people, while rude and nasty, isn’t the same as the persecution faced by LGBQ** folk. 

There is a difference between systemic oppression and persecution and people being fucking assholes. 

So while this doesn’t excuse anyone, of any sexuality, forcing unwanted sexual behaviour onto you, I would as a word of advice be careful around the equation of persecution versus stigma. While they often go hand in hand, they can be separated out into two distinct experiences. 

What ace folk face, strictly regarding sexuality, is stigma. That’s not persecution or oppression. 

Now, none of these things are good. No one should face either of them. I’m expressing a word of caution and awareness on the subject. 

There’s also the issue that many ace people on tumblr have expressed homophobic views and seek to control the sexual expression of LGBQ folk. Since Pride first and foremost was an expression of LGBQ identity, which has been historically punished by fines, jail time, and death, for anyone, of any orientation, to then police that is bad and possibly coming from a place of homophobia which should be examined.  

**trans issues, being related to gender rather than sexual identity is a different conversation. Trans folk obviously face massive amounts of persecution and hate and have been, and are, systemically oppressed. But that’s gender, we’re specifically address sexuality. There are ace trans folk, after all.4) In the end, I would encourage you to disengage from tumblr pride discourse as it isn’t healthy or useful for anyone, really. I know this can be hard when you’re in an already desert environment when it comes to support from the lgbtq+ community offline. But, as much as you can, as much as you are able, I encourage you to seek out support in-real-life networks. 

If that isn’t an option, I would recommend curbing how much of this hellsite you engage with, for your own mental and emotional health, and when you do engage be picky about mutuals and who you reach out to. 

My best experience on this site comes from keeping a narrow group with whom I engage. It keeps the Discourse down to a minimum and means I interact with people who I like and find supportive of me and of whom I am supportive. 

And, as always, read widely about all issues. Especially the history of the LGBTQ+ community. We never learn our own history and it hurts us. I can provide some sources if you want. I’d recommend not getting history or politics from tumblr unless it’s well, and reliably sourced. That’s generally a bad idea. (i say as someone on tumblr…) 

I hope this helped? I’m not sure what you were hoping for in a response. I will say I’m not ace, I’m a salty, tired queer who hates the discourse on this site about pretty much everything. So I’m trying to avoid a dog-pile in any direction. 

That said, I wish you all the best. Happy pride!

[maychorian]

I haven't been in the VLD tags in a looong time. I saw the discourse (wank) starting and jumped ship as fast as I could. I get my fix mainly through your blog. It doesn't sound like it's gotten any better than it was when I left. Also I wish fandoms didn't dissolve into ship stuff so often. Maybe it's because I'm a gen lover who only multiships for fun, but I don't get why shipping can't be chill? Why do people always have to be wieners about it all the time? Sorry for ranting i'm just salty :P

Ahh, no problem! You can come rant in my askbox any day. I DEFINITELY know that feeling. And yeah, I checked out the voltron tag last night and it was so full of salt that I had to go drink two glasses of water. 

I’m glad my blog is a happy place for you! I comb through the tag so you don’t have to.

[whereimfeminine]

Lmao I feel like every time I come to your inbox I'm complaining about niall so I'm sorry but like the more time goes by the more I'm realizing my love for him is dropping off significantly... idk I'm having trouble buying anything he says or does as sincere anymore? His tweet was ridiculous. It's his studio time with people he's paying. He knew when the Brits were. If he had wanted to go that badly he would have gone? And I mean he was able to extricate himself from the studio just fine an -1

and a half later to go to the afterparties to rub shoulders with industry execs so.... I just feel like he's trying to pander to me but I'm really not interested in any of it. For all people whinge about Harry being cold and calculating and playing his fans I see that coming from Niall 10x more than Harry. -2

Not to re-open this discourse, but there is one Slytherin in that band, and it’s Niall....

hahah ANYWAYS I am v glad to be the person you turn to when you wanna be salty at Niall, it’s one of my stronger suits. Ya like I don’t know what to make of the fact that it -appears- Liam may have made a surprise appearance last night just to get the award. And I think it’s really weird that Niall was in London but didn’t go. I don’t like to speculate on why Louis does or doesn’t do things at this point in his life, so I won’t add that. But honestly I don’t think it’s some conspiracy where Niall “couldn’t” go to the Brits but went to the party to show his support or whatever. I dunno why he didn’t go, I think it’s weird and it would’ve been great promo and I totally agree that he didn’t HAVE to be in the studio then, and you may be onto why he went to the after-party. And I think if, say, Harry just went to the after-party, people would’ve taken it to be exactly what you said--not bothering to show up to support One Direction, but showing up to further himself at an after-party. So all in all, I’m just like “meh” and they’ll do what they’ll do and it’s not really my business to figure out why they do what they do. But I agree that I am often very *eyeroll* at Niall lately. Which is a shame, because like, I don’t wanna feel that way, but alas.