Tumblr plans to make changes to appeal to new users and improve growth. The post states that Tumblr is currently difficult for new users to use and curates content poorly. Tumblr aims to improve how users discover and sign up, encourage frequent engagement, and boost creators’ ability to attract audiences. Specific changes mentioned include updating the confusing reply and reblog system to make conversations clearer and removing duplicate reblogs. Interestingly, the post does not discuss Tumblr’s plans to integrate with the ActivityPub protocol. Tumblr has had a turbulent history but has stabilized under its current ownership, though some long-time users may not want a more optimized social feed.
There’s a soft spot in my heart for Tumblr. I hope they find their way and become a bigger player.
Absolutely miserable that they would do this. You just can’t ever replace, or replicate a place like Tumblr. Tumblr isn’t for people who want well curated content. It’s not for people who want a website that works all the time or makes sense. It’s a dense forest you’re supposed to wander and stumble through, and in the process you see things that you would absolutely NEVER get the chance to see otherwise, if you hadn’t been walking in that particular place at that particular time. It’s spectacular, and so specific, and the reblog system is a huge part of that. I’m sad about reddit and twitter, but tumblr is MY house, damn it! Stay the hell away from my unprofitable weirdness hive.
Unfortunately, this is what always happens when you entrust your content to a corpo. Is there no fediverse alternative to Tumblr?
i don’t think there can be. tumblr’s draw isn’t any features it has (apart from maybe homepage customisation, but you get that with a website) it’s the features it lacks (algorithms, etc). and it’s the community, which was curated by a lot of coincidences at the right time.
you’d need to get everyone to up and move at once, with the ability to reblog posts from old tumblr. i think it’s unreplicatable
all these features and lack of featurs you can get with fedi software. The need for your friends to move so you can move is understandable, but eventually Tumblr will become so painful to use, the decision will be made for you.
Yes, the coincidences really aligned. You couldn’t really make something like that on purpose. It’s just one of those things.
That’s absolutely true. As someone who’s hung around there since 2010ish, trust is too strong a word. But it does make me sad. If there is an alternative, i’ll happily start using it. But it’s specifically the other people there and the things they do, far more than the platform itself, that I love. If it does all go to hell, I’m sure that people will talk about where they’re going and I can follow. It’s just such a distinct place. It would be the end of an era if it went the way of instagram or twitter.
I have not looked into it or anything, but I think a tumblr alternative would do very well on the fediverse. I think it could even be better for self-hosting than Lemmy.
Maybe they never should have gotten rid of the porn…
All of us in the tumblr community are fuming, the only reason why tumblr has survived all this time is because it is different from other corp social media. If they follow through with their plan to turn tumblr into a twitter/tiktok copy, I will move completely to the fediverse equivalent (Calckey is almost perfect, if just needs to let me follow hashtags)
The main thing I was concerned about is then getting rid of the reverse chronological sorting and they’ve backtracked on that, so hopefully it won’t be completely awful. It did just seem like a weird business memo that the staff were told to put on Tumblr rather than anything user-friendly. Just sounded way too corporate.
I still haven’t figured out how to use Antennas. Other than that, Calckey has been a super great experience.
It’s really easy although the instructions start “click on the UFO”…
So:
- Click on the UFO
- Click “Manage Antennas”
- Give it a name and fill with related keywords, which can be hashtags.
- All done, you now have a custom feed with those hashtags.
It’s one of the best things about Calckey, that I’ve found so far but I am still exploring.
Discord: “The biggest problem: our current usernames can often be too complicated or obscure for people to remember and share easily.”
Tumblr: “The underlying problem is that Tumblr is not easy to use.”
Why does everyone think we are collectively too stupid to figure out how to use the internet? Like holy crap.
Yeah, I know these updates are geared toward a very specific audience, but I’m allowed to resent that, lol. Stop infantilizing users; we are not stupid.
Why does everyone think we are collectively too stupid to figure out how to use the internet? Like holy crap.
Normies are not very tech savvy and they are completely unwilling to deal with even the most minor inconveniences. Most people just want to open their mouth and have someone dump some internet in there. “Having to curate an experience” is not something many people are willing to do.
Nobody wants to say it aloud because of the legal implications, but the majority of the internet is literal underage children. Like, probably over half of Discord users are actual kids who are vulnerable to being scammed when an account dupe of their favorite YouTuber friends them.
This has the effect of making the average user quite stupid, because they’re too young for intelligence or wisdom - but as long as they sign up and promise they’re 18 (“really!”) then they can be advertised to.
Shit, my friend is 44 and got scammed by a “girl” on Instagram who convinced him to mint his art as NFTs so she could buy it. He didn’t have the necessary funds (artist, remember?), so he managed to convince our other friend, a surgeon (also 44), to “invest” for a cut of the insane gains 😶
