It’s hard to organize Tumblr blogs by topic. A single one of your blogs may include your personal updates, your art, your opinions, and a YouTube video of a cat speaking Japanese, all in a single day. This has been a real limitation of the current Tumblr Directory. So, for the last few weeks we’ve been experimenting with some brand new tools for exploring Tumblr.
The new Explore page organizes and filters posts by tag. This means that every tagged post has a chance to show up in front of an audience of millions that might not otherwise see it. Think Tumblr Radar by topic.
Up top, the Tumblr Wire makes a return, pulling in featured posts in realtime. Below is a list of popular and trending tags (currently English only, with more languages coming soon). You can also Track these tags to get notifications on your Dashboard when a new post is featured.
Make sure to tag your posts where relevant to help more people find you. You can still look up any tag using the search box on your Dashboard.
We’ve already started finding posts and following blogs that we had no idea existed. Please give it a spin!
Join the Tumblr community for a party and live performance to celebrate music writing, reading and great tunes!
In light of the recent disasters, our hearts are focused on the vibrant and wonderful community in Japan. Your resilience is inspiring, and we hope that recovery will be swift and complete. 少しでも皆さんの力となり、一日でも早く日常の生活が取り戻せる事を願います。
As of today, Japanese is now the newest language available on Tumblr. We’re very grateful for our amazing members in the Japanese community, and we hope you’ll find the new option useful. You can change your language setting on your Preferences page.
To aid the relief and emergency efforts, we’re asking all of our members to contribute to Red Cross International from your Dashboard. Look for the message on the sidebar. Members who donate will unlock the Limited Edition Japanese Tumblr Logo, and Tumblr will match your contributions up to $15,000.
You can also keep up with news from Japan via the #Japan tag page.
日本の皆さま, 頑張ってください。
Love, タンブラー
Beautiful graphic by Rob Dobi
Name Lisa Bauer
First post February 2010Lisa Bauer is a multi-disciplined artist who specializes in printmaking. Her pieces symbolize short narratives of her life from different moments in time. A Brooklynite since 2006, she composes music as a member of electronic duo KiKi Bridges, takes photos, and designs clothing and accessories.
Also check out…
T Magazine
The New York Times Style Magazine.MakingOf
A fresh look into the process of making a movie by the insiders themselves.Chicks With Steve Buscemeyes
Equally intriguing and horrifying.
Reminder! Tumblr Reads is Saturday night at Mountain Bar in LA. Performance and free drinks start at 7. See you there!
It’s now super easy to add a “Share on Tumblr” button to any site.
Adding the basic Tumblr Button couldn’t be simpler. Just cut and paste the code and you’ll be off running. But the advanced options are where it gets interesting…
The Tumblr Button can give you complete control over how your content appears when shared on Tumblr. Not only does this mean specifying an excerpt or summary, but also deciding whether it appears as a Link, Quote, Photo, or Video Embed.
Even better: This can be deeply integrated with just about any publishing platform to add contextual buttons next to things like paragraphs or photos. Check out these examples.
The appearance of the button is also completely customizable.
Name Duncan Skiles
First post September 2010Writer and director Duncan Skiles is an innovative filmmaker from Fayetteville, Arkansas who shares his personal photography on photoblarg.com. Duncan’s directing work includes music videos for Reggie Watts and Chiddy Bang, and two pilots plus an hour-long special for Comedy Central. He’s a founding member of the Brooklyn-based directors collective Waverly Films, responsible for the Webby Award-winning show Stickman Exodus.
Also check out…
The Traveling Camera Club
An ongoing art project which uses disposable cameras to collect photos from around the world.NewsFlick
World events and analysis.Scipsy
Ample proof that science is awesome!
Name Ian Andersen
First post November 2009
Location Houston, TXIan Andersen always liked comics, but it wasn’t until he found James Kochalka’s American Elf that he started making his own. “The idea of just doing a strip a day about my own life really blew me away,” he says. Like many other cartoonists before him, he discovered that this daily routine pushed him to improve his ability in both drawing and writing. Ian has posted a daily comic for two years now, attends college, and drinks lots of coffee.
Also check out…
Museums and Stuff
A PhD student living in Vienna shares her love of museums.Let My People Show
Robin Cembalest, executive editor of ARTnews, blogs about art and culture.Movies and Food
An exhibition of food and drink as portrayed in film.
Like music? We fucking love music. Which is why we’re so excited to finally announce that we’ve hooked up with SoundCloud to bring their network of sound (music, podcasts, standup, journalism, and pretty much anything audible) to Tumblr.
Not only can you cut-and-paste any SoundCloud track URL into your Audio posts, now you can search SoundCloud from the comfort of Tumblr!
And did we mention you can post an unlimited number of SoundCloud tracks every day? Yeah.
But where this really shines is on your beautiful blogs. We pull in the track info, album art, and play count, to display perfectly in your theme. Here’s one in our Well Liked theme:
And just when we thought it couldn’t get any better, our wonderful friends at SoundCloud just added a “Share on Tumblr” feature to their iPhone/Android apps, Tumblr buttons on all SoundCloud tracks, and Tumblr auto-posting for SoundCloud users. *swoon*
Get to posting. Enjoy!
Tumblr iPhone 2.0: Now available on the App Store
We’re excited about this one! The app has been recoded, rewired, and rethought from the ground up to offer you the very best Tumblr experience:
- Brand new interface: Browsing your dashboard, creating a post, managing multiple blogs — the most important features are within reach so you can interact with Tumblr effortlessly while you’re on-the-go.
- Creating a post: Now easier than ever! Sharing photos, videos, links, chats, text, quotes and audio is front and center. Advanced options like saving drafts and queuing posts are one swipe away.
- Messages: View and reply to messages for each of your blogs.
- Address book: Find people to follow from your phone’s address book.
- New users: Signing up is now native inside the app.
There are tons more features and details that are awesomely crafted.
