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So... this doesn't really seem to add anything. They admit to having a Adult flag which removes the blog from all site listings and from google searches. This

So... this doesn't really seem to add anything. They admit to having a Adult flag which removes the blog from all site listings and from google searches. This effectively kills the blog. What they don't deny is recently and massively increasing the scope of the flagging. This is what people are worried about. People are claiming non-spam nsfw blogs are being flagged. Blogs that wouldn't have been banned before. Blocking tags on the mobile app is a separate issue, they don't really have a choice here. Apple will pull their app if they don't.

duskwuff 13y ago
Do we know that a significant number of non-spam NSFW blogs were being flagged as "Adult" by Tumblr, or is it possible that people were enabling this flag themselves without realizing its implications?
- makomk 13y ago
  While I don't really follow Tumblr enough to know for sure, it's not that hard to turn up blogs that aren't advertising anything, appear to be incredibly popular, and have been blocked from search. (For example http://damn-hot-gay-porn.tumblr.com/ http://damn-hot-gay-porn.tumblr.com/ - NSFW, not advertising anything that I can see, first Google result for "tumblr gay porn" and a huge number of reblogs, now completely blocked by robots.txt. Along with, apparently, most of the equally-unspammy blogs that have reblogged their stuff.) Edit: Salon.com did a feature on the best porn Tumblrs: http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/the_best_of_tumblr_porn/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/the_best_of_tumblr_porn/ It appears a large proportion of the Tumblrs featured there have also been marked as adult and removed from Google search. Edit 2: I think they've basically marked all porn-heavy blogs as adult and forcibly delisted them from search, exactly like they originally said they were going to do and regardless of how spammy they are.
tieTYT 13y ago
Unless I misunderstood, the article other I read said there was no way to search for the NSFW tumblrs (or however you'd say it) _within_ tumblr. That would be a much bigger deal than not being able to find it from google. If you can't find it within, that means it's nearly impossible to find it in the future.
rpicard 13y ago
The article says that being blocked from searches and search engines was a bug: > As some of you have pointed out, disabling Safe Mode still wasn’t allowing search results from all blogs to appear. This has been fixed. > If your blog contains anything too sexy for the average workplace, simply check "Flag this blog as NSFW" so people in Safe Mode can avoid it. Your blog will still be promoted in third-party search engines.
- ojbyrne 13y ago
  Actually I admit to not knowing much about the topic, but from the original dailydot article, it seems there are 2 levels of flagging involved - NSFW and Adult. The Adult category is the one that's been completely blackholed. This article seems to be deliberately trying to confuse the two types.
  - rpicard 13y ago
    I haven't been keeping up with this (I don't use Tumblr myself) so I can't really give an educated opinion one way or the other.
ionwake 13y ago
Wait I think your wrong - it says "Flag this blog as NSFW" so people in Safe Mode can avoid it. Your blog will still be promoted in third-party search engines." ...which implies you CAN search for NSFW tumblr blogs, with google? Or am I wrong/confused?
- vilhelm_s 13y ago
  There are two different classifications, NSFW and Adult. NSFW is opt-in by the creator of the blog, and still allows the blog to be indexed by search engines. Adult is an automatic classification applied by Tumblr (previously the blog creator could also opt in to it, but in this announcement they say that will no longer be the case), and prevents the blog from being indexed by search engines. See this table for details: http://www.tumblr.com/docs/en/nsfw http://www.tumblr.com/docs/en/nsfw
davidu 13y ago
Searching for NSFW tags is working fine now on the web app. It wasn't this morning. That was the bug they fixed.
werid 13y ago
instagram blocks certain hashtags. will just silently return zero results.
- alanh 13y ago
  Yes: Anything pornographic or even possibly-pornographic (#instahot is banned), and politically incorrect/harmful hashtags such as #thispo.
anigbrowl 13y ago
They admit to having a Adult flag which removes the blog from all site listings and from google searches. This effectively kills the blog. So what? nobody owes you a free search engine listing.
- zaidf 13y ago
  By your line of argument, tumblr doesn't owe any user anything.
  - anigbrowl 13y ago
    That's right, except insofar as they enter into some kind of contractual relationship (eg 'we will host your stuff reliably in accordance with our T&C, in return you allow us to stick adverts on it from time to time.')
    - elliottcarlson 13y ago
      Tumblr doesn't put ads on the persons blog, just the dashboard - which is the primary way users consume content on the site. The users tumblelog is theirs to do with what they want (within legal limits, and certain TOS limits...) including putting their own ads on them.
      - anigbrowl 13y ago
        It's just an example of what sort of agreement could exist between a service provider and user. I chose the example of ads because a) Yahoo now owns Tumblr, and Yahoo's major source of revenue is ads, so that could happen in future; and b) in contract law, you typically have no rights to a free service but if you there is some exchange such as their putting ads on your log then a commercial exchange wouldbe taking place.
        elliottcarlson 13y ago
        Right - I am just stating as a current Tumblr employee how it currently is - obviously the future is hypothetical and not something I will personally speculate on with regards to my employer - but I understand the point.
johnpowell 13y ago
These blogs are mostly posting pics from porn sites and slapping ads on them. Search is irrelevant. There isn't really any context. So this doesn't kill the blog as long as people spam links to the site on Reddit. They were never going to be found by (or linked to) google in the first place.

duskwuff 13y ago

Do we know that a significant number of non-spam NSFW blogs were being flagged as "Adult" by Tumblr, or is it possible that people were enabling this flag themselves without realizing its implications?

makomk 13y ago
While I don't really follow Tumblr enough to know for sure, it's not that hard to turn up blogs that aren't advertising anything, appear to be incredibly popular, and have been blocked from search. (For example http://damn-hot-gay-porn.tumblr.com/ http://damn-hot-gay-porn.tumblr.com/ - NSFW, not advertising anything that I can see, first Google result for "tumblr gay porn" and a huge number of reblogs, now completely blocked by robots.txt. Along with, apparently, most of the equally-unspammy blogs that have reblogged their stuff.) Edit: Salon.com did a feature on the best porn Tumblrs: http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/the_best_of_tumblr_porn/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/the_best_of_tumblr_porn/ It appears a large proportion of the Tumblrs featured there have also been marked as adult and removed from Google search. Edit 2: I think they've basically marked all porn-heavy blogs as adult and forcibly delisted them from search, exactly like they originally said they were going to do and regardless of how spammy they are.

tieTYT 13y ago

Unless I misunderstood, the article other I read said there was no way to search for the NSFW tumblrs (or however you'd say it) _within_ tumblr. That would be a much bigger deal than not being able to find it from google. If you can't find it within, that means it's nearly impossible to find it in the future.

rpicard 13y ago

The article says that being blocked from searches and search engines was a bug: > As some of you have pointed out, disabling Safe Mode still wasn’t allowing search results from all blogs to appear. This has been fixed. > If your blog contains anything too sexy for the average workplace, simply check "Flag this blog as NSFW" so people in Safe Mode can avoid it. Your blog will still be promoted in third-party search engines.

ojbyrne 13y ago
Actually I admit to not knowing much about the topic, but from the original dailydot article, it seems there are 2 levels of flagging involved - NSFW and Adult. The Adult category is the one that's been completely blackholed. This article seems to be deliberately trying to confuse the two types.
- rpicard 13y ago
  I haven't been keeping up with this (I don't use Tumblr myself) so I can't really give an educated opinion one way or the other.

ionwake 13y ago

Wait I think your wrong - it says "Flag this blog as NSFW" so people in Safe Mode can avoid it. Your blog will still be promoted in third-party search engines." ...which implies you CAN search for NSFW tumblr blogs, with google? Or am I wrong/confused?

vilhelm_s 13y ago
There are two different classifications, NSFW and Adult. NSFW is opt-in by the creator of the blog, and still allows the blog to be indexed by search engines. Adult is an automatic classification applied by Tumblr (previously the blog creator could also opt in to it, but in this announcement they say that will no longer be the case), and prevents the blog from being indexed by search engines. See this table for details: http://www.tumblr.com/docs/en/nsfw http://www.tumblr.com/docs/en/nsfw

davidu 13y ago

Searching for NSFW tags is working fine now on the web app. It wasn't this morning. That was the bug they fixed.

werid 13y ago

instagram blocks certain hashtags. will just silently return zero results.

alanh 13y ago
Yes: Anything pornographic or even possibly-pornographic (#instahot is banned), and politically incorrect/harmful hashtags such as #thispo.

anigbrowl 13y ago

They admit to having a Adult flag which removes the blog from all site listings and from google searches. This effectively kills the blog. So what? nobody owes you a free search engine listing.

zaidf 13y ago
By your line of argument, tumblr doesn't owe any user anything.
- anigbrowl 13y ago
  That's right, except insofar as they enter into some kind of contractual relationship (eg 'we will host your stuff reliably in accordance with our T&C, in return you allow us to stick adverts on it from time to time.')
  - elliottcarlson 13y ago
    Tumblr doesn't put ads on the persons blog, just the dashboard - which is the primary way users consume content on the site. The users tumblelog is theirs to do with what they want (within legal limits, and certain TOS limits...) including putting their own ads on them.
    - anigbrowl 13y ago
      It's just an example of what sort of agreement could exist between a service provider and user. I chose the example of ads because a) Yahoo now owns Tumblr, and Yahoo's major source of revenue is ads, so that could happen in future; and b) in contract law, you typically have no rights to a free service but if you there is some exchange such as their putting ads on your log then a commercial exchange wouldbe taking place.
      - elliottcarlson 13y ago
        Right - I am just stating as a current Tumblr employee how it currently is - obviously the future is hypothetical and not something I will personally speculate on with regards to my employer - but I understand the point.

johnpowell 13y ago

These blogs are mostly posting pics from porn sites and slapping ads on them. Search is irrelevant. There isn't really any context. So this doesn't kill the blog as long as people spam links to the site on Reddit. They were never going to be found by (or linked to) google in the first place.