#no algorithm

[honorablepeachpitt]

why does it seem like me saying "yeah i like dragon age" makes everyone and their mother assume "ohhh so you like cullen? you like solas and anders??? alistair???"

[12timetraveler]

Tumblr keeps forcing me into my "For You" page.

No!

I have carefully curated my community of like-minded weirdos and that is who I want to see 99% of the time.

[devils-sacrament-catering]

[derdave]

Man it’s like tumblr saw twitter and Reddit implode by not listening to their users and decided I want in on that.

[thewramblingwebcomicreview]

So it seems like Tumblr is thinking about creating an algorithm, like every other social media platform has, aside from the Fediverse. What happened to running on Activity Pub and integrating with the Fediverse, so folks like me can follow users on here from Mastodon, Calckey, Pleroma, WriteFreely, etc accounts? I guess everyone is seeing the decline of a place like Twitter, and the huge numbers that Meta’s Threads and/or TikTok are pulling in. Naturally, they want a slice of the action.

If this place is made to run more like Threads, Facebook, Instagram, or even TikTok, I’m done. The only reason I’m still on the birdapp site is because I have an option not to use the algorithm, and a reverse chronological timeline still exists-- as do lists. That’s also what people like about Tumblr. If this goes away, instead of gaining followers in the same way Threads has done, this social media service is just finished.There’s a reason people like it here versus elsewhere.

Make the other improvements if you want, say no to those damned algorithms.

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.

[mias-back-from-the-dead]

tbh i think the funniest phenomena that's been happening in the last couple years is "youtuber, having gone too deep into the research hole, has been made an investigative journalist against their will"

[jenjensd]

Just did a few weird searches and had the instant thought of “damn, I just fucked up the algorithm”, only to remember blessed tumblr has No Algorithm. More reasons I couldn’t leave this Hellsite

[dumpster-fire-chronicles]

not following anyone and trusting the complete lack of algorithm to find the people who need this blog the most

[peggycatrerr]

today on the train home the guy next to me was on his phone and at one point i saw him go on tumblr and he just had like. a normie dash. like it was all photography. of nature and architecture. he was using tumblr the way a heterosexual landscaper for rich people might use instagram. i actually had to watch his screen for a few seconds to be sure it really was tumblr because i was so taken aback by the content he was viewing. this is why algorithmless websites are so beautiful btw because i genuinely didn't know that this side of tumblr even existed. he didn't even so much as scroll past any text posts.

EDIT: look i'm not going to turn off reblogs but i cannot stress enough that THIS WASN'T A HIPSTER BLOG DASH IT WASN'T AN AESTHETIC BLOG DASH IT WAS THE MOST WILDLY GENERIC COLLECTION OF IMAGES YOU HAVE EVER SEEN IN YOUR LIFE. I AM NOT EXAGGERATING OR BEING A QUIRKY FANDOM TUMBLRINA WHEN I SAY "NORMIE" I GENUINELY MEAN "SO NORMAL THAT IT CIRCLES AROUND TO WEIRD". CAN ANYBODY HEAR ME? HELLO?

[shelandsorcery]

I am mad about cellphone cameras hiding the processing they do, and I am glad about software that lets me control it and opt in and out, and I dictated this rant on insta so I am resharing the images here and will attempt to turn this into a useful text post on my blog in future, when my hand is working better 🤘👍

[kevinstenhousetumblur]

Say no to the algorithm

An open letter to @staff

I already submitted this to Support under "Feedback," but I'm sharing it here too as I don't expect it to get a response, and I feel like putting in out in public may be more effective than sending it off into the void.

The recent post on the Staff blog about changing tumblr to an algorithmic feed features a large amount of misinformation that I feel staff needs to address, openly and honestly, with information on where this data was sourced at the very least.

Claim 1: Algorithms help small creators.

This is false, as algorithms are designed to push content that gets engagement in order to get it more engagement, thereby assuring that the popular remain popular and the small remain small except in instances of extreme luck.

This can already be seen on the tumblr radar, which is a combination of staff picks (usually the same half-dozen fandoms or niche special interests like Lego photography) which already have a ton of engagement, or posts that are getting enough engagement to hit the radar organically. Tumblr has an algorithm that runs like every other socmed algorithm on the planet, and it will decimate the reach of small creators just like every other platform before it.

Claim 2: Only a small portion of users utilize the chronological feed.

You can find a poll by user @darkwood-sleddog here that at the time of writing this, sits at over 40 THOUSAND responses showing that over 96 percent of them use the chronological feed. Claiming otherwise isn't just a misstatement, it's a lie. You are lying to your core userbase and expecting them to accept it as fact. It's not just unethical, it's insulting to people who have been supporting your platform for over a decade.

Claim 3: Tumblr is not easy to use.

This is also 100% false and you ABSOLUTELY know it. Tumblr is EXTREMELY easy to use, the issue is that the documentation, the explanations of features, and often even the stability of the service is subpar. All of this would be very easy for staff to fix, if they would invest in the creation of walkthroughs and clear explanations of how various site features work, as well as finally fixing the search function. Your inability to explain how your service works should not result in completely ignoring the needs and wants of your core long-term userbase. The fact that you're more willing to invest in the very systems that have made every other form of social media so horrifically toxic than in trying to make it easier for people to use the service AS IT WORKS NOW and fixing the parts that don't work as well speaks volumes toward what tumblr staff actually cares about.

You will not get a paycheck if your platform becomes defunct, and the thing that makes it special right now is that it is the ONLY large-scale socmed platform on THE ENTIRE INTERNET with a true chronological feed and no aggressive algorithmic content serving. The recent post from staff indicates that you are going to kill that, and are insisting that it's what we want. It is not. I'd hazard to guess that most of the dev team knows it isn't what we want, but I assume the money people don't care. The user base isn't relevant, just how much money they can bring in.

The CEO stated he wanted this to remain as sort of the last bastion of the Old Internet, and yet here we are, watching you declare you intend to burn it to the ground.

You can do so much better than this.

[neodymiumcuilz]

Hello dear friends! ❤🤍🖤💚

🍉I am Mahmoud Ayyad, a Palestinian from the besieged and destroyed Gaza 😭😭, coming from an extended family of young children, women and elderly people ❤❤ who have been suffering😭😭 for 300 difficult days from an aggressive war.

Our lives are harsh because we lack all the basic necessities of life. Everything has become scarce and unattainable. There is no food, no water, no medicine.

So, I ask you to help me keep my family safe and alive, especially after we had lost all our sources of livelihood.Please do not leave my family to struggle and suffer these difficult days alone. You can support my campaign by donating whatever you can or by sharing my posts to reach others who can help us survive the war to safety and peace. You are helping the lives of many people with your small contribution. Every donation makes a difference in our very difficult lives. But this is a legitimate campaign and has been checked by 90-ghost.

https://gofund.me/31c5cbe3

HELP A FAMILY FROM GAZA - VETTED HERE

Hello everyone, I am reaching you on behalf of @mahmoudayyads who is reaching out, asking for our help. The people of Gaza still need your attention, I hope you haven't forgotten the countless lives lost, I hope you haven't forgotten the fact that the people live in constant fear, surrounded by death. I hope you haven't forgotten that it will take 350 years to rebuild Gaza. I hope you won't ignore the pleas they scream, begging us to help them, save them from death. Or do you choose to ignore them, because its inconvenient?

Imagije watching as your family - children suffer and you feel powerless as you have no income to help them. Imagine fearing for your life every day- waking up to the sound of bombs. Imagine having no food or water, no health care yet disease runs rampant. That's is a reality for many in Gaza. They sleep damp, freezing and scared on the ground each night.

I am reaching you on a family from Gaza, please read her story in her words here.

Yoyr donation goes towards saving the lives of innocent children - your donation will directly help a family in need, your donation will offer hope, and a chance for a better life. You can help a family rebuild their lives, afford the basics and get to saftey, away from the constant airstrikes targeting civilians who have done no wrong.

23% OF GOAL RAISED

please support @mahmoudayyads , help get her voice heard to the world. Thank you.

[brittlebodies]

Ian Stone, Doubting Thomas, oil on linen, 12x16 in, 2023

[egophiliac]

did this as a quick scribble at like 1 AM last night and...immediately lost all motivation to ever clean it up. ( ᐛ ) but I had to draw my son being the fanciest little flower boy who ever threw petals down an aisle. oh my god.

[opossumpitcher]

conspiracy theory there are no tik tok refugees on Tumblr it's just Tumblr users who left and are coming back