I have been playing with Tumblr again (my page lives at jonbeckett.tumblr.com). I know I shouldn’t but I can’t leave it alone. It’s addictive. Imagine Twitter with images, videos, sound, quotes, and full blog posts. Imagine Facebook without family, and no walls - no borders.
Tumblr seems to be filled with creative people - photographers, artists, writers, readers… and supports those who appreciate great content too; allowing the sharing of anything as a central feature.
Rather than comment, you are encouraged to show content on your own page, with your own comment as an additional part of the content - a good analogy might be buying a print of a painting from a gallery to show in your own house.
Tumblr has lots of toys too - an opt-in directory of members, global search, all manner of apps (including a wonderful iPhone app), and integrations with numerous blogging platforms.
The lack of comments is liberating. While we like to encourage others to comment on blog posts, what purpose do they actually serve? How many of the A-List bloggers allow comments any more? There’s something uncomfortably self-absorbed about encouraging comment on the content we produce as bloggers.
Above all, Tumblr wins because everything is open. By default all of your content is available to everybody - member or not. This brings responsibility, but there is no requirement to provide a real identity within the site either.
Oh - one last thing - Tumblr has no censorship. You own your content. Remember what I was saying about responsibility?