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I don't see a problem here - given that NSFW/porn traffic is worth much less than other traffic and even less to a generalized blogging platform like Tumblr, wh

I don't see a problem here - given that NSFW/porn traffic is worth much less than other traffic and even less to a generalized blogging platform like Tumblr, what's going on is that they are presently subsidized. This is an attempt at reducing the subsidy and making the platform less attractive for pornographers or even casual NSFW bloggers. For instance, if a porn pay site wants to create a blog to promote their site, why should Tumblr make it easy for them to do this on their platform? It doesn't really help them in any realistic way.

shardling 13y ago
Apparently they consider tags like gay and lesbian to be Adult.
- derefr 13y ago
  No; the disappearance of content on these tags was coincidental in time, and mentioned in the same article only as inflammatory speculation. Tumblr hasn't said anything to indicate that this was part of their "adult content" changes. I can guess another, more likely purpose for this particular change... (I'll focus on #gay in particular here, but it applies equally well to #lesbian): Think about how tags are used on Tumblr--it's a lot like Twitter. People tag a post with something to add it to a conversation it wouldn't otherwise be a part of. So, what gets tagged as #gay? You don't tag a picture of two handsome naked homosexual men with "#gay", usually; that tag is too vague to serve any purpose. Usually the people who post porn have their entire blog dedicated to one type of porn anyway, so tagging #gay on your Gay Porn Blog would be fairly useless. Even if you did, the Safe Search mode would hit this tagstream just like any other one, so there'd be no reason to censor it in particular if that's all it was. So, #gay != gay porn, okay. So, maybe #gay is/was for rights/social justice issues related to homosexual men, then? Not in my experience; social justice folks are generally entirely too inclusive to talk specifically about #gay or #lesbian anything. I've never seen a post about gay rights specifically tagged as #gay. Maybe "#gay rights" (that's a separate tag; Tumblr allows spaces in them) but not just #gay. [On the other side of the social-justice fence, notice that #lgbt is still a working tag. http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/lgbt http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/lgbt] So what was getting tagged as #gay? I would guess (I never saw their content streams, but it seems plausible) that Tumblr eliminated these two tags in particular more for their potential for use in hate-speech or in "outing" people. I would bet (real money!) that posts were getting reblogged and tagged #gay and #lesbian for entirely malicious reasons, and Tumblr was often having receiving requests to "de-tag" the reblog so people couldn't find their post through it, somewhat like requesting to get your name taken off someone else's photo of you on Facebook. Imagine if you typed "gay" into Tumblr's search box, and the first result was a picture of your face! [I don't think Tumblr actually had a mechanism for resolving these de-tagging requests, but it was still likely a high-traffic request.] I'd bet (again, real money) that we'll see other high-potential-for-hate-speech tags disappear. In fact, they might already have, and it's just that no one has thought to look. Anyone want to think up some tags to try, and report back any that "should" have posts but are completely blank? Or, on the obverse, anyone with actual knowledge/anecdata of what #gay and #lesbian did contain before Tumblr blocked them out?
  - shardling 13y ago
    Well: >The reason you see innocent tags like #gay being blocked on certain platforms is that they are still frequently returning adult content which our entire app was close to being banned for. http://staff.tumblr.com/post/55906556378/all-weve-heard-from-a-bunch-of-you-who-are http://staff.tumblr.com/post/55906556378/all-weve-heard-from...
ramy_d 13y ago
Because they get to roll out ads. The platform is only as useful to them as the size of their user base.
- candybar 13y ago
  You can't roll out regular ads on their porn/nsfw blogs. That will destroy their relationship with advertisers or result in steep pricing discounts.
  - ramy_d 13y ago
    what do you even mean by "regular"? do you mean "targeted"? because yes, you totally can roll out targeted ads to a viewer seeking out particular content.
TheCraiggers 13y ago
What's your source for that "NSFW/porn traffic being worth much less than others"? As far as ads go, traffic is traffic, and clickthroughs are clickthroughs. Not only that, but Tumblr is a social media service, and like all social media services, they live and die by the amount of users they manage to keep. People who join for boobs are still people that can convince their friends to join.
- candybar 13y ago
  No, traffic is not traffic in advertising. If you have a popular blog on home improvements, advice on mortgages or home purchases, the price you get for advertising is going to be orders of magnitude higher than advertising on random lolcat blogs, which in turn is going to be significantly higher than ads on porn blogs.

shardling 13y ago

Apparently they consider tags like gay and lesbian to be Adult.

derefr 13y ago
No; the disappearance of content on these tags was coincidental in time, and mentioned in the same article only as inflammatory speculation. Tumblr hasn't said anything to indicate that this was part of their "adult content" changes. I can guess another, more likely purpose for this particular change... (I'll focus on #gay in particular here, but it applies equally well to #lesbian): Think about how tags are used on Tumblr--it's a lot like Twitter. People tag a post with something to add it to a conversation it wouldn't otherwise be a part of. So, what gets tagged as #gay? You don't tag a picture of two handsome naked homosexual men with "#gay", usually; that tag is too vague to serve any purpose. Usually the people who post porn have their entire blog dedicated to one type of porn anyway, so tagging #gay on your Gay Porn Blog would be fairly useless. Even if you did, the Safe Search mode would hit this tagstream just like any other one, so there'd be no reason to censor it in particular if that's all it was. So, #gay != gay porn, okay. So, maybe #gay is/was for rights/social justice issues related to homosexual men, then? Not in my experience; social justice folks are generally entirely too inclusive to talk specifically about #gay or #lesbian anything. I've never seen a post about gay rights specifically tagged as #gay. Maybe "#gay rights" (that's a separate tag; Tumblr allows spaces in them) but not just #gay. [On the other side of the social-justice fence, notice that #lgbt is still a working tag. http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/lgbt http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/lgbt] So what was getting tagged as #gay? I would guess (I never saw their content streams, but it seems plausible) that Tumblr eliminated these two tags in particular more for their potential for use in hate-speech or in "outing" people. I would bet (real money!) that posts were getting reblogged and tagged #gay and #lesbian for entirely malicious reasons, and Tumblr was often having receiving requests to "de-tag" the reblog so people couldn't find their post through it, somewhat like requesting to get your name taken off someone else's photo of you on Facebook. Imagine if you typed "gay" into Tumblr's search box, and the first result was a picture of your face! [I don't think Tumblr actually had a mechanism for resolving these de-tagging requests, but it was still likely a high-traffic request.] I'd bet (again, real money) that we'll see other high-potential-for-hate-speech tags disappear. In fact, they might already have, and it's just that no one has thought to look. Anyone want to think up some tags to try, and report back any that "should" have posts but are completely blank? Or, on the obverse, anyone with actual knowledge/anecdata of what #gay and #lesbian did contain before Tumblr blocked them out?
- shardling 13y ago
  Well: >The reason you see innocent tags like #gay being blocked on certain platforms is that they are still frequently returning adult content which our entire app was close to being banned for. http://staff.tumblr.com/post/55906556378/all-weve-heard-from-a-bunch-of-you-who-are http://staff.tumblr.com/post/55906556378/all-weve-heard-from...

ramy_d 13y ago

Because they get to roll out ads. The platform is only as useful to them as the size of their user base.

candybar 13y ago
You can't roll out regular ads on their porn/nsfw blogs. That will destroy their relationship with advertisers or result in steep pricing discounts.
- ramy_d 13y ago
  what do you even mean by "regular"? do you mean "targeted"? because yes, you totally can roll out targeted ads to a viewer seeking out particular content.

TheCraiggers 13y ago

What's your source for that "NSFW/porn traffic being worth much less than others"? As far as ads go, traffic is traffic, and clickthroughs are clickthroughs. Not only that, but Tumblr is a social media service, and like all social media services, they live and die by the amount of users they manage to keep. People who join for boobs are still people that can convince their friends to join.

candybar 13y ago
No, traffic is not traffic in advertising. If you have a popular blog on home improvements, advice on mortgages or home purchases, the price you get for advertising is going to be orders of magnitude higher than advertising on random lolcat blogs, which in turn is going to be significantly higher than ads on porn blogs.