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Tumblr Fandom Strategy Guide
Mar. 25th, 2017 11:09 amThis is going to be a long post, so I should probably state my conclusion at the beginning. Here it is: Adult men can be real assholes sometimes. Not all men, of course – some of my best friends are men! – but there's a breed of Woke Liberal Male™ that requires special caution.
Okay, so the thing about rules is that it's cool to bend them, or break them, or change them, or move entirely outside of them, but first you need to know what they are. Personally I like knowing what the rules are so that I can operate within any given environment in an efficient and rational manner, which may or may not involve actually following the rules.
In the case of chaotic and constantly changing social contexts like Tumblr, it can take months or even years to learn the rules. I don't think I understand more than a tiny bit about how Tumblr works, but I've learned a few things in the past six years that I can use to make broad generalizations.
A friend of mine from college joined Tumblr a few months ago, and he is completely clueless regarding how the platform functions. He's clueless in the real world as well, but whatever, that's cool and we love him anyway. And it's fine if he wants to use Tumblr in his own way, because who cares, you know? The problem is that he's getting frustrated that he's not instantly internet famous. He recently asked me for advice, and like a moron I took him at his word and explained three basic rules concerning how Tumblr works.
This was a mistake. Since we were talking about Tumblr, I forgot a basic rule of the real world, which is that One Does Not Offer Advice About Rules To Adult Men.
( Read more... )
Okay, so the thing about rules is that it's cool to bend them, or break them, or change them, or move entirely outside of them, but first you need to know what they are. Personally I like knowing what the rules are so that I can operate within any given environment in an efficient and rational manner, which may or may not involve actually following the rules.
In the case of chaotic and constantly changing social contexts like Tumblr, it can take months or even years to learn the rules. I don't think I understand more than a tiny bit about how Tumblr works, but I've learned a few things in the past six years that I can use to make broad generalizations.
A friend of mine from college joined Tumblr a few months ago, and he is completely clueless regarding how the platform functions. He's clueless in the real world as well, but whatever, that's cool and we love him anyway. And it's fine if he wants to use Tumblr in his own way, because who cares, you know? The problem is that he's getting frustrated that he's not instantly internet famous. He recently asked me for advice, and like a moron I took him at his word and explained three basic rules concerning how Tumblr works.
This was a mistake. Since we were talking about Tumblr, I forgot a basic rule of the real world, which is that One Does Not Offer Advice About Rules To Adult Men.
( Read more... )
