Kevin Drum thinks the anger should be directed at Apple and Tumblr didn’t have a choice. He also thinks that Tumblr should simply provide a crippled app for Apple.
I’m dubious, given the Vox article. But Drum’s comment section has a few gems among the dross: [INDENT] Mike
Just to weigh in on how bad Tumblr is at child porn.
First and simplest to fix, reporting a post for containing something illict, against the Terms of Use, or – you know – because it’s child porn – is incredibly difficult. There’s no easy access to a report button or anything. Unlike every other major service around, Tumblr is real slow to react and not pro-active at all about finding the stuff.
However, that’s not the major problem. The major problem is how stupid Tumblr is about how it reacts to child porn. It removes the image, of course. They got that much right. Except – and here’s where the sheer stupidity comes in – they do not remove the reblogging chain.
Tumblr works by somone posting an image, and various other users hitting “like” or even “reblogging” it on their own Tumblr site. Which means if you see an image (any image) you can click on it and get the entire history of everyone that’s ever reblogged it, which plenty of people use to find other Tumblr sites that are into the sorts of things they like (from pretty scenery to hardcore fetish porn or whatever).
Tumblr removes the image, but will not remove the stupid chain of reblogs and likes. Which means that while the image is gone, it leaves the people who like that stuff with a freaking LIST of everyone into the same thing – in this case, child porn!
That one, stupid, inconceivable choice – the refusal to not just remove the image, but nuke the entire thread of it’s existence – actually enables more child porn, because Tumblr has happily told the pedophiles – even if the image has been removed – where to find more just like it! Tumblr creates networks of pedophiles and child pornographers through sheer bloody stupidity.
At times I can’t help but wonder if they’ve been working as an FBI honeypot, or perhaps whether someone high up in management is big into child porn himself, because I cannot figure out any legitimate reason they don’t just nuke those images, and everyone that reblogged or liked them, from orbit. Instead of just removing only the image.
But I suspect the reality is more banal – sheer freaking laziness. Removing the image alone is sufficient to handle copyright claims, takedown notices, and the usual sort of problem. Tumblr just decided child porn wasn’t any difference, and didn’t want to spend the effort to differentiate it from other takedown notices, much less create a more effective response.
They just didn’t care until Apple came along.
Why Is Tumblr Taking the Fall for Apple? – Mother Jones [/INDENT] More generally, it’s odd that twitter and Tumblr don’t adopt a business model where you need to pay if your followers reach a certain critical mass. (Also provide a mechanism for your fans to chip in for what are essentially hosting fees.)
Don’t sweat it. It’s one of my pet peeves. Sorry if I overexplained the issue.