WEBVTT - I'll Tumblr 4 Ya 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:12.280 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there, 0:00:12.320 --> 0:00:16.080 and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host Jonathan Strickland. 0:00:16.120 --> 0:00:19.159 I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the 0:00:19.239 --> 0:00:24.200 tech are you? So? Back in early two thousand and seven, 0:00:24.680 --> 0:00:29.080 a twenty year old guy named David Karp launched a 0:00:29.200 --> 0:00:36.800 new microblogging social platform and called it Tumbler Tumblr. Carp 0:00:36.840 --> 0:00:39.959 had dropped out of high school years earlier. He had 0:00:40.000 --> 0:00:43.199 switched to homeschooling, and then right after his studies, he 0:00:43.320 --> 0:00:45.920 ended up moving to Japan. He worked for a website 0:00:45.960 --> 0:00:50.159 called urban Baby. For a while, he started a consulting company. 0:00:51.040 --> 0:00:54.520 He went from high school dropout to web professional to 0:00:54.800 --> 0:00:58.680 entrepreneur in just five years. So it's two thousand and seven. 0:00:59.080 --> 0:01:04.360 Facebook had debuted three years earlier and had emerged from 0:01:04.680 --> 0:01:10.120 the college scene. Twitter was founded the year before Tumblr was, 0:01:10.200 --> 0:01:13.559 but it wouldn't really get thrust into the spotlight until 0:01:13.600 --> 0:01:17.960 a month after Tumblr launched, because that was when Twitter 0:01:18.000 --> 0:01:20.679 had the big showing at south By Southwest in March 0:01:20.720 --> 0:01:23.880 of two thousand and seven. That's when the text spear 0:01:24.000 --> 0:01:28.720 in general actually took notice of Twitter. So Carp was 0:01:29.120 --> 0:01:32.520 fond of these things called tumble logs, and these are 0:01:32.600 --> 0:01:37.800 micro blogs. They are short form log entries online. They 0:01:37.800 --> 0:01:41.840 took their name from the tagline of a blog called Narcaia, 0:01:42.440 --> 0:01:49.160 and Narkaia had the tagline experimental impressionistic sub paragraph tumblin. 0:01:49.640 --> 0:01:56.240 So carp tumbled across a tumble log called Projectionist. Now, 0:01:56.360 --> 0:02:00.800 this tumble log was, among other things, tracking other tumblelogs 0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:02.880 across the web, so it was kind of serving as 0:02:02.920 --> 0:02:08.920 a directory of tumblelogs, and Projectionist had a very nice esthetic, 0:02:09.320 --> 0:02:11.679 which wasn't always the case with a lot of tumblelogs 0:02:11.680 --> 0:02:16.840 out there. The folks behind Projectionist had created like colorful 0:02:16.880 --> 0:02:20.920 bubbles that could house a blurb, so instead of just 0:02:20.960 --> 0:02:23.440 being text on a screen, it could really be set 0:02:23.480 --> 0:02:27.720 apart and pop. They had also created things like frames 0:02:27.760 --> 0:02:30.880 that would go around a video player so it would 0:02:30.919 --> 0:02:33.040 set again set it apart from the rest of the page, 0:02:33.080 --> 0:02:36.079 and make it look really attractive. It was much more 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:38.520 pleasant to look at than a lot of other not 0:02:38.680 --> 0:02:42.840 just tumblelogs, but blogs in general, because at this point 0:02:43.000 --> 0:02:47.160 the tools to make blogs were a little complicated for 0:02:47.240 --> 0:02:50.320 the average user. Like you could learn how to use 0:02:50.400 --> 0:02:53.640 the different tools and make a really attractive blog, but 0:02:53.800 --> 0:02:57.079 they weren't always user friendly, and Cart thought it would 0:02:57.120 --> 0:02:59.760 be really cool if someone were to develop a tumble 0:02:59.800 --> 0:03:04.120 log platform that gave users access to those kinds of 0:03:04.160 --> 0:03:08.160 tools and made it really easy. So if the platform 0:03:08.240 --> 0:03:11.320 would let users choose like a theme or a skin 0:03:12.080 --> 0:03:16.280 that would automatically apply and a general esthetic to the 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:19.280 content that was posted to the tumblelog, that could be 0:03:19.320 --> 0:03:22.240 really cool. So you can have like different types of 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:25.839 themes or skins, and that would determine how content would 0:03:25.880 --> 0:03:28.680 appear when you posted it to the tumblelog. Then the 0:03:28.760 --> 0:03:31.560 user would just focus on sharing the stuff they thought 0:03:31.600 --> 0:03:34.880 was interesting or funny or thought provoking or whatever, but 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:37.000 they wouldn't have to worry about making it look good 0:03:37.400 --> 0:03:40.320 because the platform would do that for you. And the 0:03:40.320 --> 0:03:43.520 whole point was just to post very quick things like 0:03:43.600 --> 0:03:46.520 not necessarily long thoughts, although you could do that. You 0:03:46.560 --> 0:03:50.600 could post a live journal like long entry if you 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:53.240 wanted to, but really it was about, Oh, I saw 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:55.040 this interesting thing. I'm just going to post it here 0:03:55.360 --> 0:03:59.120 and share it with people who visit my tumblelog. Not 0:03:59.200 --> 0:04:03.160 At the time, Karp was running this consulting business and 0:04:03.280 --> 0:04:06.080 he had a developer who worked with him named Marco Armint, 0:04:06.760 --> 0:04:09.960 and between a couple of consulting gigs, when they didn't 0:04:09.960 --> 0:04:12.720 have anything else going on, they decided they'd take a 0:04:12.760 --> 0:04:16.680 crack at building this microblogging platform that Karp had been 0:04:16.680 --> 0:04:18.719 thinking about for more than a year at this point. 0:04:18.960 --> 0:04:22.440 It took them all of two weeks to build the 0:04:22.480 --> 0:04:26.680 first version of Tumblr, and according to Karp, in no 0:04:26.760 --> 0:04:31.359 time at all, their brand new platform had thirty thousand 0:04:31.360 --> 0:04:34.880 people signing up for it. It was clear that there 0:04:34.960 --> 0:04:37.520 was a demand for these kinds of tools and that 0:04:37.600 --> 0:04:40.760 a lot of people who enjoyed tumblelogging really lacked the 0:04:40.880 --> 0:04:44.200 know how on how to build the kind of tools themselves. 0:04:44.720 --> 0:04:48.840 So it became a really attractive place to go and 0:04:48.920 --> 0:04:52.240 it became the earliest version of Tumblr. Carp said that 0:04:52.600 --> 0:04:55.680 the real appeal of Tumblr was that you could put 0:04:55.720 --> 0:04:58.800 anything into it and you could take anything out of it. 0:04:59.279 --> 0:05:02.000 So by that at what he meant was that a 0:05:02.120 --> 0:05:05.680 user submitting their content to their Tumbler would see that 0:05:05.720 --> 0:05:08.400 the platform took care of all the formatting no matter 0:05:08.680 --> 0:05:11.360 what kind of content that was. If it was a video, 0:05:11.960 --> 0:05:13.960 if it was some text, if it was an image, 0:05:14.360 --> 0:05:17.000 Tumblr would handle the formatting, so you didn't have to 0:05:17.040 --> 0:05:19.919 worry about it, and Tumblr would make sure that it 0:05:19.960 --> 0:05:23.960 looked nice according to whatever esthetic you had picked. As 0:05:23.960 --> 0:05:27.600 for taking stuff out of Tumblr, well, Tumblr had an 0:05:27.640 --> 0:05:31.719 application programming interface or API, and it meant that you 0:05:31.760 --> 0:05:35.240 could actually have it play nice on other sites all right, 0:05:35.320 --> 0:05:38.920 Like you could have your own website that you operated, 0:05:39.320 --> 0:05:43.320 and you could use a Tumblr API plugin so that 0:05:43.360 --> 0:05:46.480 you could pull content from your Tumbler to display on 0:05:46.520 --> 0:05:50.000 your owned and operated site. And that way you didn't 0:05:50.040 --> 0:05:53.720 have to give your users another link to follow if 0:05:53.760 --> 0:05:56.440 you wanted them to be able to see your Tumblr material. 0:05:57.000 --> 0:05:59.960 So your one site that could be the focal point 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:03.920 for all the stuff that you were active on online 0:06:04.640 --> 0:06:08.799 could include your Tumblr activity. Now, something else that contributed 0:06:09.240 --> 0:06:14.040 to the early adoption of Tumblr, particularly among students, was 0:06:14.120 --> 0:06:19.960 that Tumblr's ascent coincided with the rise of the smartphone. 0:06:20.120 --> 0:06:23.479 The popularity of the iPhone and then later on android 0:06:23.480 --> 0:06:26.359 phones meant that there was a new way to interact 0:06:26.360 --> 0:06:29.000 with the Internet in general and the Web in particular, 0:06:29.240 --> 0:06:33.440 and a new way to generate content for the Internet 0:06:33.720 --> 0:06:37.960 and the Web. You know, smartphones had cameras. Now, y'all, 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:41.960 there are entire eras of my life that are largely 0:06:42.080 --> 0:06:46.960 unphotographed because carrying a camera around was a choice. You know, 0:06:47.080 --> 0:06:49.480 you know, you didn't. You didn't have a camera that 0:06:49.560 --> 0:06:52.640 was incorporated into some other device that you happened to 0:06:52.680 --> 0:06:55.680 carry with you wherever you went. If you were going 0:06:55.720 --> 0:06:58.479 someplace and you had a camera with you, it was 0:06:58.520 --> 0:07:01.520 because you decide you needed to have a camera with you. 0:07:02.040 --> 0:07:04.880 The rise of smartphones, however, meant that cameras started to 0:07:04.920 --> 0:07:08.840 become almost omnipresent no matter where you went, right, especially 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:12.480 as more and more people started to buy smartphones. So 0:07:12.520 --> 0:07:17.240 it really changed the way we generate and consume content 0:07:17.480 --> 0:07:21.040 on the web. Tumblr became a place that could act 0:07:21.080 --> 0:07:24.760 as a display for all the stuff that you created 0:07:25.040 --> 0:07:27.520 or the stuff that you liked and you wanted to reblog. 0:07:28.120 --> 0:07:30.400 It could be a joke, it could be a video clip, 0:07:30.440 --> 0:07:32.600 It could be a digital photo. It could be an 0:07:32.640 --> 0:07:36.480 animated GIF or jiff if you insist on pronouncing it 0:07:36.520 --> 0:07:40.360 that way. It could be one of any other type 0:07:40.440 --> 0:07:43.960 of web friendly types of content and it would fit 0:07:44.360 --> 0:07:47.840 on Tumblr. And so Tumblr became kind of a web 0:07:48.040 --> 0:07:52.880 culture nexus. You know, there were entire memes that would 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:59.160 gather support and adoption on Tumblr and then spread throughout 0:07:59.200 --> 0:08:02.080 the rest of the web. Another important element of Tumblr 0:08:02.120 --> 0:08:05.720 was that, unlike other social platforms, users were encouraged to 0:08:05.760 --> 0:08:10.280 adopt a pseudonym for their Tumblr account, so the account 0:08:10.520 --> 0:08:15.280 could be a really accurate reflection of the personality of 0:08:15.320 --> 0:08:17.960 the user. You know, it could be an accurate reflection 0:08:18.080 --> 0:08:21.800 of what they liked and what they valued, and you 0:08:21.800 --> 0:08:24.560 could get a really good feel for what was important 0:08:24.600 --> 0:08:27.040 to the user and still not know who the user 0:08:27.200 --> 0:08:31.119 was because their account is all under a pseudonym, And 0:08:32.400 --> 0:08:35.960 that meant the user could still maintain some anonymity, which 0:08:35.960 --> 0:08:38.400 could be really important. It meant that users actually had 0:08:38.600 --> 0:08:42.760 a lot more freedom to express themselves without worrying about 0:08:42.760 --> 0:08:46.560 it perhaps impacting them in other aspects of their lives. 0:08:46.720 --> 0:08:50.320 Right Like, let's say that you're a kid and you 0:08:50.400 --> 0:08:54.720 realize that you're queer, but you also are in a 0:08:54.760 --> 0:08:58.520 really sort of conservative region where you can't really have 0:08:58.600 --> 0:09:02.839 a safe space to talk about this with anybody else, 0:09:03.080 --> 0:09:07.800 and so you feel very ostracized and alone and perhaps intimidated. 0:09:08.440 --> 0:09:12.160 Tumblr was a place where you could start to explore 0:09:12.679 --> 0:09:16.520 those aspects of your personality and to express yourself, and 0:09:16.640 --> 0:09:21.599 the pseudonym could give you some protection from consequences you 0:09:21.679 --> 0:09:24.680 might face in your day to day life. So it 0:09:24.760 --> 0:09:28.359 really was an important part of a lot of people's 0:09:29.000 --> 0:09:32.400 self discovery journey. Tumblr was a big part of that. 0:09:33.080 --> 0:09:35.520 So besides just being a place to share in web culture, 0:09:35.559 --> 0:09:39.200 Tumblr served a role in creating web culture. There were 0:09:39.360 --> 0:09:43.640 entire memes and in jokes that took shape in tumblrs. 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:47.160 The folks on Tumblr developed their own sort of language 0:09:47.640 --> 0:09:52.640 in references and punchlines, and they would use that as 0:09:52.679 --> 0:09:55.880 shorthand in communication with one another. And then a newcomer 0:09:56.000 --> 0:09:58.800 or outsider would look at Tumblr and be totally in 0:09:58.840 --> 0:10:02.040 the dark and find it just obtuse and confusing. There 0:10:02.080 --> 0:10:03.920 was a little bit of tribalism going on, and there 0:10:03.920 --> 0:10:07.439 were of course tribes within tribes, because entire tumbler communities 0:10:07.840 --> 0:10:11.640 would begin to form around specific topics, a lot of 0:10:11.640 --> 0:10:14.800 them being pop culture topics. You had tumblers that would 0:10:14.840 --> 0:10:18.920 focus on fan theories about specific shows, that kind of thing. 0:10:19.000 --> 0:10:22.160 You had whole communities that would pop up around fans 0:10:22.200 --> 0:10:25.360 of a television show who were really hoping that two 0:10:25.559 --> 0:10:27.520 of the characters on the show would end up in 0:10:27.559 --> 0:10:32.959 a romantic relationship. Right the so called shipping fandoms, and 0:10:33.120 --> 0:10:36.319 the discussions in these tumblers, or at least the blogging 0:10:36.400 --> 0:10:38.880 in these tumblers, because you weren't leaving comments, you were 0:10:38.920 --> 0:10:43.320 just blogging in it. They ran the full spectrum, from 0:10:43.400 --> 0:10:47.240 wish fulfillment fantasies to even scholarly takes on how shows 0:10:47.240 --> 0:10:50.680 were playing to or sometimes outright exploiting the fan bases 0:10:50.760 --> 0:10:54.480 by teasing a relationship with no intent on actually following 0:10:54.520 --> 0:10:57.400 through with it. There are actually some really remarkable video 0:10:57.480 --> 0:11:01.120 essays on YouTube that look into this. Arrah z has 0:11:01.160 --> 0:11:07.640 done quite a few videos that focused on Tumblr culture 0:11:07.880 --> 0:11:14.400 and how various properties exploited that culture. So yeah, really 0:11:14.440 --> 0:11:18.559 fascinating stuff. And there were other communities that coalesced around 0:11:18.640 --> 0:11:21.920 real world concerns, some of which were seen as taboo 0:11:22.040 --> 0:11:26.280 or socially unacceptable in order order to address them in 0:11:26.360 --> 0:11:29.480 other types of communities, so users would lean on Tumblr 0:11:29.480 --> 0:11:33.280 communities as I mentioned earlier, to explore their own identities. 0:11:33.640 --> 0:11:38.080 They could experiment, they could find understanding and acceptance among others. 0:11:38.360 --> 0:11:42.280 So on Tumblr you could find a really robust LGBTQ 0:11:42.400 --> 0:11:47.600 plus community, for example, and communities within that community. You 0:11:47.640 --> 0:11:51.160 could also find communities that supported people who had disabilities 0:11:51.400 --> 0:11:54.559 or chronic illnesses. You could find the sort of communities 0:11:54.600 --> 0:11:58.360 that just didn't have the same representation on other social 0:11:58.400 --> 0:12:02.880 platforms or in real world spaces, particularly for people who 0:12:02.960 --> 0:12:06.680 lived in fairly rural or remote areas, So that was 0:12:06.720 --> 0:12:10.160 actually a really valuable thing as well. You also got 0:12:10.160 --> 0:12:12.920 some extremes in that, and often those would be the 0:12:12.920 --> 0:12:17.840 ones held up to ridicule or criticism that people would say, oh, 0:12:17.880 --> 0:12:20.440 here's a tumbler that's completely dedicated to people who are 0:12:20.480 --> 0:12:24.480 fantasizing about being robots, and then that would turn into 0:12:24.559 --> 0:12:26.840 kind of a punchline. So there was a downside of 0:12:26.880 --> 0:12:31.400 this as well. But I think the value that Tumblr 0:12:31.600 --> 0:12:35.160 presented toward people who really didn't have a support system 0:12:35.200 --> 0:12:37.600 in other areas of their lives was something that was 0:12:37.640 --> 0:12:43.040 really special. Tumblr would actually see its major boost and 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:47.000 popularity in the early twenty tens, Like it definitely had 0:12:47.080 --> 0:12:50.560 early adoption, but that was in the tens of thousands. 0:12:50.600 --> 0:12:52.720 It would be around twenty ten where you'd start to 0:12:52.760 --> 0:12:57.200 see millions of accounts on Tumblr. And we also saw 0:12:57.440 --> 0:13:01.040 a lot of interesting subcultures form around that same time. 0:13:01.240 --> 0:13:05.120 For example, do you remember Bronie's That's the term for 0:13:05.240 --> 0:13:10.600 adult fans male identifying adult fans, usually of the animated 0:13:10.640 --> 0:13:14.680 series My Little Pony. Friendship is Magic. Technically, the brony 0:13:14.880 --> 0:13:19.520 culture actually originated on a different website, the message board 0:13:19.600 --> 0:13:23.520 four chan, but the subculture also put down roots over 0:13:23.640 --> 0:13:27.320 on Tumbler and flourished there. For the record, I don't 0:13:27.320 --> 0:13:31.120 see anything wrong with adults enjoying cartoons, even cartoons that 0:13:31.160 --> 0:13:35.240 are ostensibly meant for kids. A lot of great cartoon 0:13:35.320 --> 0:13:40.199 creators actually intentionally into greate cross generational appeal in their works. 0:13:40.880 --> 0:13:43.559 It would be inaccurate for me to call myself a bronie. 0:13:43.640 --> 0:13:45.840 I don't have anything against Bronie's. I just never got 0:13:45.880 --> 0:13:49.120 into My Little Pony, but goodness knows, I'm a big 0:13:49.120 --> 0:13:51.200 fan of other cartoons that are meant for kids, like 0:13:51.200 --> 0:13:54.720 Phineas and ferb and Hey Season five is coming soon anyway. 0:13:55.080 --> 0:13:59.360 Tumblr's role in Internet culture grew and its user base 0:13:59.480 --> 0:14:03.920 also grew, and while the company's valuation continued to increase, 0:14:04.480 --> 0:14:09.480 nearing an estimated one billion dollars by twenty ten, Kart 0:14:09.559 --> 0:14:12.600 was determined to prevent the sorts of monetization efforts that 0:14:12.640 --> 0:14:15.280 he was seeing elsewhere on the web, so he kept 0:14:15.360 --> 0:14:19.720 Tumblr free from advertising effectively at least until twenty twelve, 0:14:19.920 --> 0:14:23.680 and even then he was very methodical in how ads 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:26.120 could run on the site and the sort of brand 0:14:26.160 --> 0:14:30.040 deals that Tumblr would do, and he eschewed the migration 0:14:30.240 --> 0:14:33.240 toward influencer culture, which was starting to take off at 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:37.760 that point. That's why Tumblr allowed for pseudonyms, and it 0:14:37.800 --> 0:14:40.680 didn't do things like track the number of folks who 0:14:40.680 --> 0:14:44.280 were following a specific tumbler. In fact, it didn't even 0:14:44.320 --> 0:14:48.600 allow for comments on posts. You could reblog a post, 0:14:49.000 --> 0:14:51.359 and you could put in your own take on your reblogging, 0:14:51.640 --> 0:14:54.680 but you couldn't just leave comments underneath a post that 0:14:54.760 --> 0:14:59.240 was there. He was all about removing the barriers between 0:14:59.280 --> 0:15:02.440 creators and the stuff they wanted to post. He wanted 0:15:02.480 --> 0:15:06.000 to take as much of that away as possible so 0:15:06.040 --> 0:15:09.800 that it could have a more pure path from creator 0:15:10.040 --> 0:15:15.320 to audience. But in twenty thirteen, things would change. I'll 0:15:15.320 --> 0:15:27.800 explain more after we take this quick break. Okay, before 0:15:27.800 --> 0:15:30.240 the break, I mentioned things would change for Tumblr in 0:15:30.240 --> 0:15:34.720 twenty thirteen. In that year, Tumblr had seventy three million 0:15:34.920 --> 0:15:40.200 accounts and a suitor came calling. A suitor by the 0:15:40.280 --> 0:15:45.240 name of Yahoo. At that time, Marissa Meyer was the 0:15:45.320 --> 0:15:48.640 CEO of Yahoo's She had been part of Google. She 0:15:48.760 --> 0:15:52.280 was actually employee number twenty at Google, and then she 0:15:52.400 --> 0:15:56.280 left to become CEO of Yahoo in twenty twelve. And 0:15:56.480 --> 0:15:59.920 this was a really big move for Yahoo, this acquisition. 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:03.240 Yahoo had also been in kind of a decline leading 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:05.200 up to Meyer's arrival. There had been sort of a 0:16:06.600 --> 0:16:11.280 revolving door of CEOs for a while. You know, leadership 0:16:11.360 --> 0:16:14.280 was undergoing a lot of tumultuous change. And then Meyer 0:16:14.400 --> 0:16:19.400 was coming in and attempting to create some stability in 0:16:19.440 --> 0:16:22.640 the company, and Yahoo made an offer that Tumblr could 0:16:22.680 --> 0:16:26.920 not refuse. The offer was valued at around one point 0:16:26.960 --> 0:16:33.960 one billion dollars. Meyer promised not to screw Tumblr up. 0:16:34.640 --> 0:16:37.800 Now you might wonder why Karp would agree to sell 0:16:37.840 --> 0:16:41.520 Tumblr in the first place. After all, he previously had 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:45.520 been giving interviews to the media saying that he didn't 0:16:45.560 --> 0:16:47.920 make Tumblr in order to make money. That money was 0:16:47.960 --> 0:16:52.760 not the motivating factor for his involvement with Tumblr. He 0:16:52.800 --> 0:16:56.040 wanted to build a foundation upon which people could create stuff. 0:16:56.400 --> 0:16:59.920 That's what pushed him, he claimed. But following Yahoo's move 0:17:00.400 --> 0:17:03.960 their offer to Tumblr, Karp would say that he had 0:17:04.040 --> 0:17:07.040 a lot of conversations with Marissa Meyer, and he found 0:17:07.080 --> 0:17:10.440 that Tumblr and Yahoo were in alignment on a lot 0:17:10.440 --> 0:17:14.000 of topics, including the use of native advertising and branding 0:17:14.400 --> 0:17:18.280 on Tumblr. And while he wasn't originally looking to sell 0:17:18.320 --> 0:17:22.600 the company, the opportunity meant that Tumblr would have massive 0:17:22.680 --> 0:17:26.760 corporate support while entering into the next stage of its growth, 0:17:27.200 --> 0:17:31.760 which he said the Tumblr just couldn't do without something 0:17:31.880 --> 0:17:35.440 like a Yahoo behind it. So Karp would actually stay 0:17:35.480 --> 0:17:38.119 on with Tumblr. He would serve as the CEO for 0:17:38.359 --> 0:17:42.080 the Tumblr division within Yahoo. I think it's safe to 0:17:42.080 --> 0:17:45.720 say that Marissa Meyer and Yahoo had pounced on Tumblr 0:17:45.720 --> 0:17:49.360 without really understanding what they were getting into. For one thing, 0:17:49.960 --> 0:17:52.439 Tumblr was popular, you know, there were more than a 0:17:52.560 --> 0:17:56.720 million active users in more than seventy million accounts, and sure, 0:17:57.160 --> 0:18:00.960 venture capital companies have been making investments into Tumblr to 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:04.240 the point where the valuation was hovering around a billion dollars. 0:18:05.119 --> 0:18:09.840 But Tumblr wasn't at all profitable. It really wasn't a 0:18:09.880 --> 0:18:13.800 revenue generator. It was running these brand campaigns and stuff, 0:18:14.280 --> 0:18:17.600 and had made some strategic partnerships with a few brands, 0:18:18.200 --> 0:18:21.199 but the money coming in didn't even come close to 0:18:21.280 --> 0:18:24.280 covering the bills. It wasn't covering the operating costs of 0:18:24.320 --> 0:18:27.520 the servers, let alone the salaries of the people who 0:18:27.560 --> 0:18:31.480 worked there, and so turning Tumblr into a profitable business 0:18:31.960 --> 0:18:35.280 was going to be a real challenge. See Tumblr was 0:18:35.359 --> 0:18:39.040 also extremely permissive when it came to the types of 0:18:39.119 --> 0:18:42.520 content that users could share. A lot of that content 0:18:43.160 --> 0:18:47.800 was of a more mature nature. There were entire communities 0:18:47.880 --> 0:18:51.439 focused on sexuality, and it wouldn't take a whole lot 0:18:51.480 --> 0:18:56.400 of searching to actually find pornographic material shared on the platform. 0:18:56.880 --> 0:19:00.520 So let's say that you run a company. It's a 0:19:00.520 --> 0:19:04.080 brand company, and you want to advertise to folks, and 0:19:04.160 --> 0:19:07.119 social platforms can be a really valuable place where you 0:19:07.160 --> 0:19:11.240 can set your advertising. But then let's say you're worried 0:19:11.280 --> 0:19:14.280 that your ad might appear next to a pornographic video 0:19:14.760 --> 0:19:18.560 or pornographic gif or photo. Plus, the people to whom 0:19:18.560 --> 0:19:21.760 you're advertising are all operating under pseudonyms, so you don't 0:19:21.800 --> 0:19:24.560 actually know who those people are. One of the more 0:19:24.680 --> 0:19:28.760 valuable aspects of most social networks is that the advertiser 0:19:28.800 --> 0:19:31.480 can learn an awful lot about the customers that they're 0:19:31.520 --> 0:19:36.400 advertising to. Targeted advertising is really big business, but it's 0:19:36.400 --> 0:19:40.520 harder to target users when they are quasi anonymous not impossible. 0:19:40.600 --> 0:19:42.480 In fact, you could argue that a person's name is 0:19:42.520 --> 0:19:45.480 one of the least important parts of who they are, 0:19:45.960 --> 0:19:49.399 but it still was an issue. Now, this meant that 0:19:49.440 --> 0:19:53.639 when Yahoo tried to monetize Tumbler, they ran into some 0:19:54.240 --> 0:19:58.840 resistance among companies that were advertisers. The sexual nature of 0:19:59.000 --> 0:20:02.399 much of the content was on Tumblr was kind of 0:20:02.400 --> 0:20:05.719 a non starter for a lot of companies. Advertisers were 0:20:05.720 --> 0:20:10.080 more interested in other platforms that had a combination of 0:20:10.160 --> 0:20:14.119 content moderation and users having to create accounts under their 0:20:14.160 --> 0:20:18.480 actual names and share more information about themselves, more direct information, 0:20:18.560 --> 0:20:21.840 not just not just indicating who they were through blogging, 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:25.320 but outright telling the platform who they were, where they 0:20:25.320 --> 0:20:30.040 were from, how old they were, etc. So the semi 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:34.280 anonymous nature of Tumblr, coupled with the proliferation of sexual 0:20:34.320 --> 0:20:38.200 content meant that it was not an attractive place for advertisers. 0:20:38.720 --> 0:20:41.920 Then we get to the debacle known as dash Con. 0:20:42.640 --> 0:20:46.760 Originally it was called as tumble Con USA, so this 0:20:47.000 --> 0:20:50.760 was an in person convention and it had no official 0:20:50.760 --> 0:20:56.399 connection to Tumblr. It was catering to Tumblr communities, but 0:20:56.600 --> 0:21:00.959 in itself was not part of Tumblr. Organizers were all 0:21:01.040 --> 0:21:04.240 part of various tumbler communities, and they had this ambitious 0:21:04.240 --> 0:21:08.840 idea to create a live event where Tumblr community members 0:21:08.920 --> 0:21:12.320 would gather in person and celebrate the stuff that they loved. 0:21:13.240 --> 0:21:16.840 There would also be live performances, there'd be bands, there'd 0:21:16.880 --> 0:21:20.800 be a live podcast from Welcome to night Vale, a 0:21:20.840 --> 0:21:23.040 fantastic podcast. If you've never listened to it, you should 0:21:23.080 --> 0:21:26.600 check it out. I really enjoy that one. There would 0:21:26.640 --> 0:21:29.840 be panel discussions, there'd be meet and greets, and there 0:21:29.880 --> 0:21:35.160 would be the ballpit. So the story of dash Con 0:21:35.800 --> 0:21:39.440 is a complicated one. It involved a lot of bad decisions, 0:21:40.480 --> 0:21:43.520 mostly guided through a lack of experience and knowledge, as 0:21:43.560 --> 0:21:46.280 well as a lack of capability, which again not a 0:21:46.359 --> 0:21:49.600 slight on the people who wanted to throw this event. 0:21:49.680 --> 0:21:53.280 I think originally the organizers really did want to throw 0:21:53.480 --> 0:21:55.480 a great event. One of them, at least, I think, 0:21:56.240 --> 0:22:00.000 was sincere in that desire. The entire time, they weren't 0:22:00.119 --> 0:22:02.440 up to the task, and that's again not a slide 0:22:02.480 --> 0:22:05.240 on them. They were tackling something they had never done before. 0:22:05.880 --> 0:22:10.040 And it turns out that throwing live events is hard, right. 0:22:10.119 --> 0:22:14.600 You usually have entire departments of people who are dedicated 0:22:14.600 --> 0:22:17.840 to specific tasks within throwing a live event to get 0:22:17.880 --> 0:22:19.800 it to get off the ground, and even then you're 0:22:19.800 --> 0:22:22.240 going to run into issues, particularly the first couple of 0:22:22.280 --> 0:22:26.119 years you try and have an event, so it's always difficult, 0:22:26.160 --> 0:22:29.359 and it was, you know, a long shot at best 0:22:29.359 --> 0:22:32.600 for this thing to go off. Well, the whole event 0:22:32.680 --> 0:22:35.920 became legendary for how poorly it was launched and run. 0:22:36.280 --> 0:22:41.040 How some of the organizers ended up begging attendees to 0:22:41.200 --> 0:22:45.359 contribute cash right there at the event in an emergency 0:22:45.400 --> 0:22:48.400 effort to keep the event going after it had already started. 0:22:48.760 --> 0:22:50.560 You know, it's kind of like saying, oh, no, we 0:22:50.640 --> 0:22:53.159 need to lay down more railroad tracks because the train's 0:22:53.240 --> 0:22:56.920 running out of track to run on. Numerous folks who 0:22:56.960 --> 0:23:00.720 were meant to appear at the convention canceled because they 0:23:00.760 --> 0:23:03.520 sensed that the event organizers were in over their heads 0:23:03.560 --> 0:23:06.840 and would be unable to meet their obligations. The whole 0:23:06.840 --> 0:23:10.399 thing became a big joke, and the punchline was almost 0:23:10.480 --> 0:23:13.640 always that darn ballpit, which, if you've not seen pictures, 0:23:14.119 --> 0:23:18.600 was a pretty pathetic little feature. Anyway, dash Con wasn't 0:23:18.600 --> 0:23:23.280 officially affiliated with Tumblr, so it wasn't Tumblr's fault that 0:23:23.440 --> 0:23:27.240 dash Con was such a total disaster, but Tumblr's reputation 0:23:27.320 --> 0:23:30.040 still took a bit of a hit just through association. 0:23:30.480 --> 0:23:33.160 By the way, I already mentioned Sarah Z, who has 0:23:33.200 --> 0:23:37.080 done numerous video essays on Tumblr culture. She has also 0:23:37.240 --> 0:23:41.840 done an incredible video essay, like an exhaustive video essay 0:23:42.480 --> 0:23:45.520 about the disaster that was Dashcan. So if you're really 0:23:45.560 --> 0:23:48.760 curious about all the dirt and all the tea being spilt, 0:23:49.119 --> 0:23:52.040 I recommend going to YouTube and checking out Sarah Zed's 0:23:52.119 --> 0:23:57.639 It's like Sarah z Sarah Z's video essay on Dashcan. 0:23:58.040 --> 0:24:01.400 Back to Tumblr though, so, the user base of Tumbler 0:24:02.040 --> 0:24:07.240 was slowly growing older because that's how time works, and 0:24:07.640 --> 0:24:10.000 as they were aging, they were also kind of aging 0:24:10.040 --> 0:24:13.199 out of Tumblr for various reasons, and so some of 0:24:13.200 --> 0:24:16.760 them were migrating over to other platforms that were introducing 0:24:16.840 --> 0:24:20.199 features that they found to be, you know, something that 0:24:20.240 --> 0:24:23.040 they wanted to do, something that wanted to use moving on. 0:24:23.720 --> 0:24:26.400 That doesn't mean that everyone left Tumblr, but a lot 0:24:26.440 --> 0:24:28.640 of people did so folks began to move to other 0:24:28.680 --> 0:24:33.520 networks like Facebook or Twitter for different reasons. Tumblr saw 0:24:33.520 --> 0:24:36.879 a decline in user activity and Yahoo was forced to 0:24:36.920 --> 0:24:42.480 acknowledge that they had massively overpaid for Tumblr. In early 0:24:42.480 --> 0:24:46.200 twenty sixteen, Yahoo wrote down the value of Tumblr by 0:24:46.200 --> 0:24:49.919 more than two hundred million dollars. The company as a 0:24:49.920 --> 0:24:53.359 whole had posted a four point four billion dollar loss 0:24:53.440 --> 0:24:56.280 in Q four of twenty fifteen. If that wasn't just Tumblr, 0:24:56.320 --> 0:24:59.639 that was all of Yahoo, but Tumblr was part of 0:24:59.680 --> 0:25:02.920 the problem. One could make a decent argument that Yahoo's 0:25:02.920 --> 0:25:05.440 acquisition of Tumblr was one of the big booboos and 0:25:05.560 --> 0:25:10.160 mergers and acquisitions in the tech space. And in twenty seventeen, 0:25:10.560 --> 0:25:15.520 Yahoo found itself the subject of an acquisition. So as 0:25:15.560 --> 0:25:20.480 a reminder, Yahoo acquired Tumblr in twenty thirteen, and then 0:25:20.480 --> 0:25:25.679 in twenty seventeen, Yahoo itself became acquired by Verizon. Because 0:25:25.720 --> 0:25:30.840 there's always a bigger fish, so Verizon acquired Yahoo and 0:25:30.960 --> 0:25:34.760 its subsidiaries, which included Tumblr, and they bought it all 0:25:34.840 --> 0:25:38.680