Secure your place at the Digiday Publishing Summit in Vail, March 23-25
Deciding whether or not to censor content is a tricky matter for publishers and platforms. Facebook is notoriously quick to censor content it deems inappropriate (like pictures of two men kissing or women breast-feeding). Now Tumblr is getting in on some censorship action.
Last week Tumblr announced its new censorship policy, which bans “self-harm blogs” that glorify eating disorders. This is tricky territory, of course.
“We are deeply committed to supporting and defending our users’ freedom of speech, but we do draw some limits,” Tumblr writes in a blog post. “As a company, we’ve decided that some specific kinds of content aren’t welcome on Tumblr.”
The company has posted a draft of this addition to its content policy but is also asking the Tumblr community for its input. Do you think this move to censor is appropriate when plenty of other negative/violent/inappropriate content (like fat-bashing posts and posts about outward violence) gets the green light, as Johanna de Silento points out in her Thought Catalog article? Leave your stance in the comments.
More in Media
In graphic detail: Middle-tier creators are fueling the next phase of the creator economy
Facts and figures behind the growing middle tier of creators who make less than macro creators, but convert more.
How medical creator Nick Norwitz grew his Substack paid subscribers from 900 to 5,200 within 8 months
Creator Playbook: Unpacking the strategy behind medical YouTuber Nick Norwitz turning to Substack to significantly grow his brand.
Media Briefing: In the AI era, subscribers are the real prize — and the Telegraph proves it
In an era where AI is eroding referral traffic and third-party distribution, a subscriber who pays directly has become the most valuable reader a publisher can own. Springer just bought over a million of them.