TL;DR: Tumblr is discontinuing its Post Plus feature, allowing creators to charge for content, starting December 1st. This decision follows a leaked memo about downsizing due to struggles in meeting usage and revenue targets. Post Plus, introduced in 2021, didn’t meet expectations, leading to its discontinuation. Existing Post Plus content will be private from January 2024, and creators can’t produce new Post Plus content. Tipping will remain, but the future of Blaze, the sponsored post feature, is uncertain. (via chatGPT)
Tumblr is still around???
This gets asked every time Tumblr is mentioned online. It’s still around and has a large, thriving userbase. It’s one of the last slices of old-school internet that exists today and, because of that, is very resistant to modern monetisation tactics and enshittification which makes shareholders cry in their sleep.
Yeah despite Yahoo trying like hell to kill the platform, its user base has steadily grown since. 2014: https://www.statista.com/statistics/183857/unique-visitors-on-tumblr-in-the-us/ (about half of its user base is in the US).
Yep. A crowd settled back in after the dust settles from the porn bans. But the owners are still profit driven and you know, anything that isn’t growing by a huge amount every year is dead to them.
People keep saying it’s dead to them but the company’s own statements seem a lot more optimistic, imo. I think they’re just refocusing, and dumping a lot of the extraneous “let’s be an everything platform” features the userbase didn’t want anyway. Tumblr isn’t a giant cash so far as I know, but its userbase is sizable and stable, and recently grown since reddit and twitter took a tumble.
As a platform, there’s a lot to recommend it, I think. It’s one of those situations where the experience you get out of it depends on how you curate it. So like, you can go down fandom rabbitholes, or webcomic rabbitholes, or you can entirely ignore that and just subscribe to ocean science blogs, or to photography blogs, or so on. There can be drama in some parts, but that can also be entirely avoided in your feed if that’s your preference. I like it a lot better these days than I did like 5-10 years ago.
I’d agree on that. If they can drop the video stuff and focus on what makes Tumblr a good space and it’s unique features they could last a good long time and we can avoid the complete homogenization of social media.
Nobody used it, so everybody is happy they removed this. Hope they remove Tumblr Live next
Apparently they we’re contractually obligated to include that, which is why there’s an option to snooze it at all. I’m sure they’ll get rid of it eventually.
I wonder how many people will leave Tumblr for CoHost after this death flag the site received.
Automatic is trying to breake at least even with the site, but I’m afraid they’ll do worse once that will fail as well.
In hindsight this sounds like a good idea, but certainly no one used this junk.
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Tumblr is doing away with Post Plus, the feature that lets creators charge users a subscription to access their content.
Starting on December 1st, creators will no longer be able to enable Post Plus on their blogs.
The discontinuation of Post Plus comes just weeks after a leaked memo revealed the platform’s plans to downsize after struggling to meet usage and revenue targets.
In a post on Tumblr, the platform’s staff members say they “originally introduced Post+ to uplift and support the vast swathes of incredible creators.” However, the company says the feature “didn’t land as we’d hoped” and made the decision to discontinue it after considering feedback and usage.
Tumblr says existing Post Plus content will be available through the end of this year, but it will be marked as private starting in January 2024.
Creators also won’t be able to create new Post Plus content at this time, and subscribers will no longer be charged.
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