Every once in a while, a social media platform runs into bad luck. Sometimes that’s because its new owner decided to forget what the word “verified” means, and sometimes it’s because the U.S. government decides to ban it. But one thing is consistent across these situations: Tumblr will be there to take advantage of them.
When X introduced its new verification system under Elon Musk, Tumblr trolled it by selling “important blue checkmarks” that “may turn into a bunch of crabs at any time” to its own users. (And people bought them.)
Now, in a less troll-y move, it’s following in every other platform’s footsteps and launching a TikTok competitor. But for those of you rolling your eyes, hang on–this isn’t as random as it seems.
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In the leadup to TikTok’s (ultimately temporary) ban, pretty much every competitive platform began appealing to its user base, the soon-to-be “TikTok refugees,” in a desperate move to steal some of TikTok’s short-form domination. Instagram, for example, reportedly offered a whopping $50,000 a month to TikTokers who would start posting their videos on Reels instead. That makes sense, because they’ve all been riding TikTok’s wave, and all offer similar video products that theoretically could capture and keep users.
Tumblr, however, was one of the few platforms that didn’t have its own TikTok copycat–so it was surprising, then, that it too saw a surge of new users when TikTok was banned Jan. 19.
The platform told TechCrunch it saw a 35% spike in iOS app installations and a 70% increase in people joining Communities, where users can congregate forum-style to discuss shared interests. Several Communities that rose to prominence were specifically about TikTok, including TikTok Refugees and TikTok Repository, where creators encouraged one another to post the videos they’d made for TikTok.
Based on that traffic, Tumblr is taking an experimental project from 2015–a GIF discovery feature called Tumblr TV, which later was further developed to support video–and rolling it out to all users.
Whether the project is actually ready for wide rollout is another matter. Like TikTok’s feed, Tumblr TV is vertical and swipeable, but as TechCrunch points out, it’s got issues. Tumblr TV includes both GIF and video content, but the GIFs are sized-up and grainy, and many videos are cropped awkwardly because they were never intended for vertical viewing.
TikTok may have its own issues, but it also has, at its core, an elegant UI experience for both creators and viewers. And right now, Tumblr TV, well…doesn’t.
If TikTok ever were to be permanently banned, we don’t think its users would turn to Tumblr as their next vertical video platform. Tumblr has always been a text- and photoset-based platform rather than one optimized for video. But we do think that, judging by the user surge it saw Jan. 19, it may become a place where creators can commiserate if TikTok leaves U.S. soil.
