In which I blame Tumblr for destroying fandom (kinda)

[the_deep_magic]

Ugh.  I have only caught the barest whiff of wank (that doesn't sound right, but you know what I mean) on Tumblr because I follow only a few people, but I have to say, I think the shift to Tumblr is seriously undermining fandom, any fandom, as a community.  Just about every fandom I follow is involved, and I know wank is nothing new, but even a few years ago when people were still mostly on LJ, the wank happened on Tumblr but was discussed elsewhere.

I understand why some people left LJ; I don't understand the mass exodus and why they went to Tumblr instead of Dreamwidth or something similar.  Maybe that kind of platform has run its course?  Or with the rapid growth of AO3, fandom has split into one platform for fics and one for, well, fannishness?

When I started back in the Dark Ages, it was listservs and archives (remember geocities and angelfire?  I try not to).  I wasn't hugely active back then -- it took LJ to make me an real participant, and maybe that's why I'm clinging to it so hard.  But it really does seem ideal: fics, comments, communities, and discussion threads all in one place.  Now you've got Tumblr, which is like a bunch of people standing around in a circle shouting at each other -- in order to participate at all, you have to listen to everything everyone else says (often over and over) and in order to join in, you've got to repeat everything everyone else before you said first.  Also, everyone's blindfolded and has access to a stack of bricks to throw at will with no sense of responsibility for who the brick hits.

Yikes, maybe if I'd actually gotten my rhetoric degree, I could've come up with a better metaphor to explain the sense of disconnection, but Tumblr really, really frustrates me.  The reblogging of the same things over and over is an annoyance that I suppose I can live with, but the inability to respond to someone's post without a) reposting it and everything before it; and b) cutting off the tags, which are a significant means of communication for some reason, make it impossible to have a conversation.  And without that, there's no community.  Yeah, you can get your rant or your meta or your angry screed out to more people at once, but it doesn't matter how many people click that little heart; it's just you up on that soapbox.

I'm not holding out hope that people will move back to LJ.  Technology changes, and I can live with that.  But the move to Tumblr has had an overall isolating effect -- slightly compensated for, I think, by Twitter -- and I just want to know what comes next.  I hope the generation moving into fandom now knows that it's more than just reblogging gifsets and adding "SO MANY FEELS" at the bottom.

By the way, I know I'm being a hater here, but "feels" is a fucking verb.  Tumblr!speak may actually annoy me more than IM!speak.

Comments

[pikasafire.livejournal.com]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who feels this way.

I've been clinging to LJ because there's not enough discussion on any of the other platforms - twitter is great, but limited to 140characters and WHAT KIND OF CONVERSATION IS THAT? And Tumblr? I don't really get it? Like, I have one and I love it for reblogging pictures I like, but I essentially use it as a backup for my pictures folder on my computer and text posts annoy me. I WANT TO LOOK AT PICTURES OF ZQ, NOT HAVE TO READ WANK.

IDK, IDK. I've stopped even posting my fic on LJ these days because communities have dried up. I thought it was maybe just bandom that'd been abandoned for AO3, Twitter and Tumblr, but it seems like all of them. And posting on LJ is starting to feel like shouting into a void.

I know how you feel, bb :( I want everyone to come back to LJ where there's actual, y'know, conversation.

[eefreeboo.livejournal.com]

I feel this way too mostly. It's great for pretty pics and the place to go if you want to see them first but it's a nightmare to navigate and rubbish for interacting. I also find some of the etiquettes strange and am forever wary of standing on toes if I post or reblog so I mainly just lurk. It also seems extremely cliquey at times (people only reblogging things friends post when you know they've seen the same thing posted before; only using the tags for comments. The latter can be quite amusing but you have to click on each individual post for each person to see them. Who on earth has the time to do all that?!). It's a nightmare for spoilers/rants atm too so I'm just skimming it for pics and hoping I don't see anything that drives me mad.

I was hoping everyone would come back to LJ around now and maybe they will, slowly but surely, especially once the fic starts up again. FWIW I'm planning to do a post on _pinto later of all the interviews there's been so far, just to have them all in one place as much as anything. Things have been slow on the comm so far but hopefully they'll pick up soon :)

[meine-liebe.livejournal.com]

I mostly just keep tumblr for pics. tbh the fans in tumblr are scary. they can just flame everyone/everywhere just to re-tumblr a pic/fic/news. which is kinda mess up i think.

[therumjournals.livejournal.com]

Please do this! I keep seeing references to various interviews on Twitter, then I come to LJ and either see just a few gifs or nothing, and I don't have time to go scouring for the sources. I would love you forever if you would put them all in one place where we could squee over them communally :)

[therumjournals.livejournal.com]

I agree with everything you said. I've been clinging to LJ and really hope that people will come back, but not holding out hope due to the combo of AO3 and tumblr....which are just NOT the same for incubating that communal fandom feeling.

[marlee813.livejournal.com]

I'm glad someone could say this better than I could. This has been something that's really been bothering me since that whole malicious attack that had people leaving LJ like it was on fire. While I've had tumblr longer than I've had LJ, there truly is no sense of community in the sense of everyone coming together. I miss the community feeling and the mass flailing of fans in one convenient thread. While I love tumblr, mostly for its pictures, the wank for ANY fandom is getting ridiculous and I find myself having to avoid tags for certain people; and while I love AO3, it's mostly centered around kudos, where comments are rare and limited to the fandom of the moment. It's a lazy way of saying you like the fic, whereas I prefer the insightful or even flaily comments people either leave or I leave for them.

I'm gripping tightly onto LJ as well. And I hope people start coming back.

[greenteaduck.livejournal.com]

THIS THIS THIS

I have been feeling this exact same way! And it's impossible to tear myself away from tumblr completely... but it's such a volatile place and there's little to no sense of community. I think a really big thing is "followers" vs "friends". On lj everyone is on equal ground but on tumblr if the person you follow does not follow you back it gives them sort of superiority--which is so fucked up.

[lil-insanity.livejournal.com]

Now you've got Tumblr, which is like a bunch of people standing around in a circle shouting at each other -- in order to participate at all, you have to listen to everything everyone else says (often over and over) and in order to join in, you've got to repeat everything everyone else before you said first. Also, everyone's blindfolded and has access to a stack of bricks to throw at will with no sense of responsibility for who the brick hits.

This is the greatest analogy I have ever heard in my life.

THIS IS EXACTLY WHY I HATE TUMBLR.

[lousy-science.livejournal.com]

Yeah, my tumblr dash is completely fan-free, it's pictures of old jewelry and craft tips and shit like that, because I got too worn down by the fandom (and social justice warrior shit)(and the intersections betwixt the two). I'm happy being an old ass fan.

[leopardchic79.livejournal.com]

Well said! I don't even have a Tumblr coz every time I go over there I end up glaring at my screen wondering what the hell is going on. I'd say it makes me feel old but actually it just annoys me. I love AO3 for archive & easy-searching purposes. I've taken to Twitter & Instagram for a lot of random fandom squee, but I definitely miss the community atmosphere of LJ!

[asya-ana.livejournal.com]

Couldn't agree more. One thing I've been trying is subscribing to individual Tumblr blogs in my RSS reader so I can still see the pretty pictures without having to actually log in and read the wank/see the same pic reblogged an infinite number of times. I'm not sure fandom is coming back to LJ, but my hope is it will stay active enough to remain interesting. I don't need to be at the heart of the fandom frenzy (read: Tumblr style BNF star worship) to enjoy fandom; maybe having a smaller pocket of friendlier people on other platforms is enough.

[sleepygoof8784.livejournal.com]

*tackle hugs* This is what I have been trying to find a way to say. I agree 1000%. You've said it way more articulately than I can and I'm so glad that I'm not the only person who feels this way.

I've been praying that people will come back because one of the things that drew me out from being a lurker in the old days of listserves and archives was the community that LJ brought. Also the fact that I didn't have to be a computer genius to find (and communicate) with people who love the same things I do.

I want the community part of fandom again.

[anivad.livejournal.com]

"I WANT TO LOOK AT PICTURES OF ZQ, NOT HAVE TO READ WANK."

this is the best reaction to Tumblr.

[anivad.livejournal.com]

Get Missing E! then you can see all the tags in one place.

[anivad.livejournal.com]

On the bright side - social media platforms rise and fall, and perhaps one day there'll be another that's even better for fandom!

[ninety6tears.livejournal.com]

It's all very sad. I'm okay with interacting with people on Tumblr when I already know them from somewhere else; otherwise I feel like I have to be really invasive to interact with them at all. I need a comment platform to feel like a person is actually welcoming outside commentary. Apparently people do make friends there but it's really not for me.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

I still post everything to LJ first, but yeah, even when I post to a comm I feel like I'm talking to myself.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Yeah the fact that there's no "mutual followers only" option makes me very, very hesitant about what I post. I mean, even posting publicly to LJ, usually only your friends read it (and THAT'S incredibly telling: "friends" vs. "followers"). On Tumblr, it could get reblogged who knows where or in what context and you could have people jumping all over themselves and you to prove how morally superior they are. It hasn't happened to me, but mostly because I only reblog funny pics.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it seems like everybody goes off the rails for things that are taken out of context. I don't know, maybe it's just a small number of very vocal people, but it seems like the crazier they are, the more likes and reblogs they get.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I love AO3 as a fic archive (No character limits! Searchable tabs! PDFs aplenty!) but it's definitely not the same as posting to an LJ comm. Kudos are nice, but comments are better.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I have a love-hate relationship with kudos. And hit counts. I've had several people comment to me that they pick what they read by the ratio of kudos to hit count, which is kind of ridiculous. And if I were mostly posting Pinto instead of Teen Wolf fics (which is the fandom of the moment), I'd hardly get any comments at all.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I don't even want to have a Tumblr, but I feel like I have to in order to keep up with anything, since much less filters through to LJ these days.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

SOMEBODY LOVES MY ANALOGY. MY EXISTENCE HAS BEEN VINDICATED.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Ha ha, you're probably better off for it. And yeah, when did the social justice warriors descend like a horde of locusts?

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

I STILL wonder what the hell is going on. And I adore AO3 as a backup archive, but all the searchable tags in the world don't a community make.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I have no idea how RSS readers work. And I do love the Pinto pictures, but EVERYBODY I follow reblogs them, so it takes days and days for my dash to load. :oP

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

It's incredibly gratifying to hear this described as "articulate." ;o) I don't know that people will find their way back to LJ, but I hope whatever supersedes Tumblr brings the community aspect back.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Yes! I live in hope!

...say, you don't happen to design these things, do you? ;o)

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I hadn't even really touched on that -- it's really hard to meet new people because you've got to ask strangers private questions instead of just replying "SWEET I LIKE YOUR ICON" in a public comm.

[anivad.livejournal.com]

:D
MAYBE ONE DAY.

[meine-liebe.livejournal.com]

it's not small number coz I heard it's getting bad as in even the actors are 'aware' of the fanatical fans. The thing is tumblr most of the time have no lock post or filters. everyone everywhere can see, unlike lj/dreamwidth. even AO3 have lock fics only members can see.

[bdl.livejournal.com]

i agree with you. tumblr is kind of a mess with no decent method of communication between users. i love lj and i've loved it for more than a decade! i wish i could breathe new life into for all of us!

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Me toooooo!

[medea-fic.livejournal.com]

I just don't have time for Tumblr - literally, not sarcastically. It seems to move SO fast, and there is SO much re-posting of the same thing. Even Twitter these days is almost too much for me. I am regularly 2 days behind on reading my feed. (This is why I pop up and randomly comment on 2-day-old tweets.)

Also, the age on Tumblr seems to skew a lot younger. That's not a bad thing, but it's not my thing.

There are a few people's Tumblrs that I visit from time to time to see how they're doing, but they're all people I met on LJ and who aren't posting on LJ as much these days. I do prefer LJ above any form of social media - I don't even have a Facebook! - because of the opportunity it gives to read in-depth posts and have in-depth discussions. I feel like I *know* people on LJ, especially the ones (like you) who post about their lives and have interesting anecdotes and thoughtful posts. For those reasons, it also seems to me like a better platform for fandom. I'm not opposed to Dreamwidth, either, but LJ is more familiar to me.

I'd like to post more on LJ myself, but I'm struggling to manage my work-life balance at the moment, bleh.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

No, I totally understand about not having time. I follow about 30 people, probably only about half of whom post regularly, and it takes me a good 45 minutes to scroll through a day's worth of posts. Twitter I can (mostly) keep up with, but Tumblr takes so long to load, especially on my phone, that I pretty much just check it once a day. And the problem is that, since we're all in the same fandoms, I see the same pictures and gifsets posted 15 times each. I love all the new Pinto stuff, but show it to me ONCE.

And you're probably better off without Facebook. I think it's bad for my mental health, so I mostly just use it to play Family Feud and post funny stuff on my sister's wall (since I don't want her to know my Twitter or Tumblr name!)

[(Anonymous)]

yeah, i love tumblr for the pretty pictures, but i only follow like 15 people or so, which keeps it manageable. Twitter i learned to love through ruthless use of the lists. and facebook... needs to diaf.

i do think LJ will pick up again soon, though- AO3 is great for fic (though I do sadly miss the comments, sigh), but I think people just needed new material, and the community will rise again. :)

-z

[charliechaz.livejournal.com]

Just wanted to double down on your comments and the comments of everyone here.

I too remeber the dark ages...ugh....but I am also not into tumblr/twitter for fandoms. For allt he reasons previously mentioned.

LJ remains, and likely will remain, the place for community; but I like AO3. I like the kudo button (i would like there to be re-read button). I like that it is an archive...I am less worried about founding an account suddenly suspended. It is great for longer fics or older fics....on LJ you have to have the link or manually search a commnunity for fics that are few years old. It is an archive, not really a discussion place. And they are trying to implement universal tagging...for almost every fandom ever. That is not easy.

But LJ can be about quality, not quantity and leave tumblr for.....whoever.

[the-deep-magic.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I agree that AO3 is better for storing and finding fics. And kudos are nice, but LJ seemed more conducive to comments. I like the idea of a re-read button, though! I just want everything that isn't LJ or AO3 to go away. :oP