Remember how we were just talking about teenagers flocking to Tumblr and Twitter instead of using Facebook? Well, Tumblr just started freaking out all of them.
On Thursday, the social media company decided to roll out sponsored posts onto its web-based network (sponsored posts were already introduced to the mobile version about a month earlier). To no one's surprise, many users of the site hated the change.
Much of Tumblr's growth over the recent past has come from teen users looking for Facebook alternatives. They don't like the overwhelming adult presence on Facebook, or the fact that their parents on it, and many have migrated to Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram.
While that means a surge in members and usage for Tumblr, it also means dealing with an extremely emotional and fickle age group. According to TechCrunch, Tumblr users will only have to deal with a maximum of four sponsored posts a day, which are marked as ads by a dollar sign in the upper right corner of the post, but that hasn't stopped the waves of criticism of lapping up on the network's digital shores. Tumblr's assurance that the ads will blend in seamlessly with their feed didn't seem to comfort its users, either.
Tumblr's plans to expand advertising on its platform had already been in the works before Yahoo came calling with its $1 billion acquisition (remember, sponsored posts it the mobile version last month), but already users see their web-based introduction as a decree from Yahoo.
In fact, even before Yahoo's purchase of Tumblr was completed, many users decided it was time to abandon ship and jump to Wordpress. That migration continued after the acquisition, and it's likely more will flee if they're as angry about these ads as they say they are.
Here's a sampling of what users were saying about the ads (via Huffington Post):
"WTF HOW DO I GET RID OF THESE TUMBLR ADS??
"OMG SOMEBODY HELP ;A;" wrote user dead-totsuka.
Others took a less crazed approach, asking Tumblr members to band together.
"I need someone to work on getting rid of the upcoming ads that will appear on our dashboards in the form of regular posts," chalkhopscotch wrote.
"I also need you all to be smart enough to not like and reblog the stupid publicity, which only proves that publicity is working!
"I'm just so angry at so many levels. The sense of foreboding is killing me," she concluded.
"hope you know we all hate you [Yahoo]... just give tumblr back to david, we miss him," beauhrooks wrote.
