It’s all too sad. So little time to say hi.
To the editors, thank you. To the new and shiny ones, I look forward to seeing you on my dash.
To the absent souls, stop it.
He does what he does. I do what I do. Never the twain shall meet.
I’m just saying, Tumblr, fix your recommendation engine…
A while ago I mostly stopped actively pursuing followers. I feel like things are more organic and happier when the encounters are unscripted.
As a result or, maybe, as a side-effect, I reached 247 followers last October. Not a huge deal, but I recall thinking how close I was to 250.
And then the deactivations started.
In some deranged parody of a grandmother on a front porch, you all sent me back and forth from 247 to 235 or so at least 4 or 5 times.
But now it’s been reached, and no impetus can derail the achievement.
The moral of this story is that I lose a meaningless numerical stat every time you deactivate. So don’t. ‘Cause it also makes me cry. The thought of you deactivating, not the stat.
The only way to play is not to win.
Seriously, diversify. Find the best – people who inspire you. Find the prodigies – people you want to see grow and succeed. Find friends.
Don’t follow someone back if they make you hate your dash. Don’t think that selling books to each other is a reasonable business model. Don’t pretend that following people who write what you like to read will be sufficient to provide fertile fields of inspiration.
Diversify. Delve into many communities (inside and outside of Tumblr) and make lots of friends along the way.
Remember: Footnotes don’t work on Tumblr.
Just a note, cause I love this.
Footnotes1 are an awesome part of the markdown feature Tumblr has implemented. It’s actually really easy once you learn the syntax. Plus it does a nice thing with links taking the user back and forth to the relevant parts of your text.
I’m not sure if Tumblr’s implemented the full bibliographic implementation of multi markdown yet, but footnotes are beautiful, especially on your actual site/tumblr theme.
Here’s a footnote. ↩
… I just had to remind myself to put the “e” in tumbles.
…experimenting with stream of consciousness today, I’ve noticed. :p
I added a couple of links to my theme today. Because, I like my followers (except those 3) and I thought, “why not?”
Fair warning though. I’m not on my Facebook much. And my twitter is mostly geek/design-oriented stuff with the occasionally clever thing that I’d write and only get crickets. So probably no one’s interested. Which is fine. I like you all enough that I don’t mind contact from any direction. That’s why my email and phone number are up on my site.
… change user names like I change my socks.
You’re confusing us old people.
Feste's Lute 