Tumbler?

I’m going to talk about Tumblr in this blog post. First, some figures:

<!--[if !supportLists]-->· <!--[endif]-->Tumblr supports 8 languages (English, German, Japanese, French, Italian, Turkish, Spanish and Russian)

<!--[if !supportLists]-->· <!--[endif]-->38,000 posts per minute (Facebook has nearly 300,000 posts per minute)

<!--[if !supportLists]-->· <!--[endif]-->42% of original posts are photos.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->· <!--[endif]-->218% growth – from June 2010 to June 2011 in the U.S (compare huge number to these social networking sites in the U.S in the same period: LinkedIn (63%), Twitter (31%), Facebook (14%) and poor old MySpace (-50%)

<!--[if !supportLists]-->· <!--[endif]-->Age composition of Tumblr says that 29.3% of the users are 18-24

I want to explore and discuss an entirely different social network with you guys. It’s called Tumblr and whether or not you’ve stumbled upon the site before, I think you’ll find it interesting in terms of how different it really is to what we are all used to seeing in Facebook and Twitter.

In my opinion it’s a mixture of many networks we have seen come and go (and stay) over the years. The one that springs to mind in terms of similarity is MySpace because it allows you to be as unique as you really are in the real world; a personal space if you like. Its significant difference however is how you interact with other people, where you ‘follow’ other blogs rather than it being a two way thing, like Twitter. I’ve Googled a lot of info graphs on social network categories and not one could categorize Tumblr, not in Pictures, music, crowd sourced content, blogs, micro media or blog communities although I would place it under the latter.

Tumblr does appeal to a younger demographic though. I’ve been on and off the site for about a year now and it gives off a feel of ‘the cool kid’ of social networks. I say this because it is very much like the cool group from school that always kept themselves to themselves and were oh so snobby to newcomers. This is a problem with it, if you are under 18 and are looking for some solace in a fun, easy going alternative to Facebook, you will be surprised at how hard it is to make friends on it. I know about 5 of my followers. But I live in the U.K where it is third in visits behind Brazil and the United States. Check these figures out:

Countries using Tumblr (with percentage of unique visits):

United States – 42.31% Brazil – 9.46% United Kingdom – 5.97%

So, what is the likelihood of me knowing someone on Tumblr? Very little I think.

With Tumblr and social apps like Instagram, people can share aspects of their lives and interact on a more personal, intimate basis without being forced to give up too much of their personal privacy. Also, Tumblr’s comment system is less user-friendly than Twitter and Facebook. I don’t know whether the intentions for this were to force users to become lazy and just blog stuff in mass numbers without any interaction whatsoever but it does make things easier for Tumblr users, the practice of re-blogging pictures, quotes and videos can be seen with most users. This is extremely appealing to the celebrity and to the brand. One thing about Youtube and Facebook for brands and celebrities (or celebrities who are considered brands in their own right) is they have to endure a decent amount of hate-filled comments to whatever they post. At Tumblr, it’s still there but not for all to see.

http://mashable.com/2011/11/14/tumblr-infographic/