A better, more positive Tumblr
Since its founding in 2007, Tumblr has always been a place for wide open, creative self-expression at the heart of community and culture. To borrow from our founder David Karp, weâre proud to have inspired a generation of artists, writers, creators, curators, and crusaders to redefine our culture and to help empower individuality.
Over the past several months, and inspired by our storied past, weâve given serious thought to who we want to be to our community moving forward and have been hard at work laying the foundation for a better Tumblr. Weâve realized that in order to continue to fulfill our promise and place in culture, especially as it evolves, we must change. Some of that change began with fostering more constructive dialogue among our community members. Today, weâre taking another step by no longer allowing adult content, including explicit sexual content and nudity (with some exceptions). Â
Letâs first be unequivocal about something that should not be confused with todayâs policy change: posting anything that is harmful to minors, including child pornography, is abhorrent and has no place in our community. Weâve always had and always will have a zero tolerance policy for this type of content. To this end, we continuously invest in the enforcement of this policy, including industry-standard machine monitoring, a growing team of human moderators, and user tools that make it easy to report abuse. We also closely partner with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and the Internet Watch Foundation, two invaluable organizations at the forefront of protecting our children from abuse, and through these partnerships we report violations of this policy to law enforcement authorities. We can never prevent all bad actors from attempting to abuse our platform, but we make it our highest priority to keep the community as safe as possible.
So what is changing?
Posts that contain adult content will no longer be allowed on Tumblr, and weâve updated our Community Guidelines to reflect this policy change. We recognize Tumblr is also a place to speak freely about topics like art, sex positivity, your relationships, your sexuality, and your personal journey. We want to make sure that we continue to foster this type of diversity of expression in the community, so our new policy strives to strike a balance.
Why are we doing this?
It is our continued, humble aspiration that Tumblr be a safe place for creative expression, self-discovery, and a deep sense of community. As Tumblr continues to grow and evolve, and our understanding of our impact on our world becomes clearer, we have a responsibility to consider that impact across different age groups, demographics, cultures, and mindsets. We spent considerable time weighing the pros and cons of expression in the community that includes adult content. In doing so, it became clear that without this content we have the opportunity to create a place where more people feel comfortable expressing themselves.
Bottom line: There are no shortage of sites on the internet that feature adult content. We will leave it to them and focus our efforts on creating the most welcoming environment possible for our community.
So whatâs next?
Starting December 17, 2018, we will begin enforcing this new policy. Community members with content that is no longer permitted on Tumblr will get a heads up from us in advance and steps they can take to appeal or preserve their content outside the community if they so choose. All changes wonât happen overnight as something of this complexity takes time.
Another thing, filtering this type of content versus say, a political protest with nudity or the statue of David, is not simple at scale. Weâre relying on automated tools to identify adult content and humans to help train and keep our systems in check. We know there will be mistakes, but weâve done our best to create and enforce a policy that acknowledges the breadth of expression we see in the community.
Most importantly, weâre going to be as transparent as possible with you about the decisions weâre making and resources available to you, including more detailed information, product enhancements, and more content moderators to interface directly with the community and content.
Like you, we love Tumblr and what itâs come to mean for millions of people around the world. Our actions are out of love and hope for our community. We wonât always get this right, especially in the beginning, but we are determined to make your experience a positive one.
Jeff DâOnofrio CEO
What they mean is a more censored tumblr. Well that's cool, I mean it's not like people explore things that aren't family friendly or anything. What crap. And to those pussies who comment on this saying "waaa it's a good thing my virgin eyes hated it", yeah well fuck you nerds, I didn't like having your mindless crap shoved in my face when I'm just trying to get my jollies and I didn't even subscribe to you in the first place.
I put up with the unwanted ads. I put up with the shoveling of shit I didn't ask for in my feed. I even put up with not being able to find adult hashtags. But this? No. Fuck you tumblr. Hey @staff, I like to express myself by posting pics of my newly in shape body in a thong. Where's my room for expression?
And here's the thing : yes, there are other sites to watch porn on. but there are fewer and fewer to actually curate and create your own space for it and communicate with like minded others.
Since we are censoring "bad" stuff, how about censoring pro-anorexia blogs? Antifa blogs? Fat acceptance blogs? Blogs about smoking? Violence? Anything glorifying war? Kids running with scissors? The list goes on. No? I guess it's easier to punch low when you're already nearly dead.
Here's the other thing: There's also tons of other sites where you can post your shitty memes and cringy fan art and list all of 8,572 genders to circle jerk to, jeff. Like... ALL OF THEM. This was the ONE place Jeff. The ONE PLACE where we could enjoy ourselves. But no. You decided to play the orwellian media game on your site in your pathetic attempt to save a sinking ship. @staff... Enjoy your bullshit game while it lasts. You're about to join MySpace, and it's been a long time coming.
