The Latest Tumblr Unfunny Business

[soc_puppet]

Shortest version of what's been going down the past few days: Trans woman gets frustrated by how Tumblr seems to be banning trans women and transfemmes disproportionately (often under the guise of "inappropriate content" that is usually entirely SFW) expresses frustration with description of cartoon violence in support request. Matt Mullenweg, CEO of Automattic (parent company of Tumblr, etc) decides that it counts as a real threat of violence and loses his shit, bans her even further, chases her to off-site accounts to reveal personal data (mainly other blog names of the sort you would typically see on Tumblr but likely wouldn't be printed in most newspapers), starts banning anyone who speaks up on her behalf, to the point where it's pretty clear he's basically sitting on the tag for himself and hunting for any allies she has. All this while he's already supposed to be on a three month sabbatical from Tumblr and other work.

Some sort of stopgap seems to have been put in place to prevent his virtual rampage. Meanwhile, a number of trans Tumblr staffers have made a post about how they condemn Matt's actions, and included a list of things they plan to do going forward to mitigate such bullshit; other Tumblr users who are experienced in corporate speak have translated it and also conveyed the fact that the writers of the post have essentially put their jobs on the line to make it in the first place, and unless something very drastic happens to Matt and his ability to control the future of Tumblr, their careers may be in jeopardy because of their attempts to mitigate his bullshit.

Here is a link to said post, plus a reblog by a former Tumblr staffer who is breaking down some of the behind-the-scenes details involved.

My point: Matt's sabbatical is over in May. I don't know if this will be the thing that finally makes Tumblr hostile enough to its own userbase for the majority to abandon it for greener pastures, but I feel like it wouldn't hurt to take the remaining time until Matt returns to prepare for the worst.

Comments

[mistressofmuses]

Agree with all of the above.

Definitely a very disappointing and upsetting situation all around. I realize that people tend to declare the tumblr-apocalypse at least a few times every year, but... this could actually be The One.

It depends what happens when he comes back, but worst case scenario, that is still a few months to put together some alternatives.

[soc_puppet]

Yeah, even if Tumblr continues to exist after Matt gets back from his sabbatical, unless he at least looks like he's trying to make a positive change, and the trans staff who spoke up in his absence keep their jobs, it won't be the kind of site I want to patronize anymore. And that's on top of the rumored AI stuff (a possible deal with Midjourney, which may or may not involve implied permission to use all of Tumblr as training data).

If the trans staffers keep their jobs, I might be willing to stick around and see what happens, but if not? I don't think I'll be comfortable continuing t use the site.

[mistressofmuses]

Yeah. What happens in May will determine a lot about how I feel about using the site. If there are improvements and changes brought about, then cool. If it turns into scorched earth, firing staffers and continuing with the tantrum? Not so much.

The potential Midjourney deal is very troubling. If that hits while things are already shaky from this whole event, that could be a HUGE problem for the site.

Half of why I'm there is for art and artists that I follow, and I find it likely that a fair number of them will gtfo if there's the threat of their work being used for AI training data.

[grayestofghosts]

This is totally nuts. I've seen some comments on the 'car full of hammers' but the actual discussion of the corners of tumblr I'm on do not seem to be seriously considering moving at all. I think so many people are used to false alarms on tumblr at this point.

[soc_puppet]

Honestly, the problem isn't even that I expect Matt to self-destruct and take Tumblr down with him, or at least not all that much; the problem is more that a number of trans Tumblr staffers have literally put their jobs on the line to make the post I linked above. As this post by former Tumblr staffer jv explains, one of the more likely things that Matt might do is come back after his sabbatical, reject all of the attempts at making Tumblr better outlined by the trans staffers, and fire the trans staffers to boot. If he does that, Tumblr will obviously continue to exist, but he will have made it clear that the platform is not safe for trans people, and he has no intention of making it any safer; to the contrary, in fact. (Also, if Tumblr does stick around, there's a decent chance that it's at least in part because of AI related fuckery, and I want no part of that, either.)

I don't think I can in good conscience continue to use a site where the CEO deliberately targeted a trans woman, used his privileges to share some of her private information, and then fired the trans staffers who dared to speak up and try to make a positive change. Which is why I'm encouraging people to back up their accounts and start looking at other sites; not because Tumblr will necessarily cease to exist (though that is a possibility), but because from the top down it will cease to be the sort of site I want to patronize.