Voices
LEAH
GOODMAN
HUFFINGTON
06.09.13
KAREN BLEIER/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
My Fear That Tumblr As
We Know It Is Ending
MORE THAN ONCE when I have
felt down about something — a
fight with a friend or a bad grade
on a test in school — I have resorted to Tumblr. Rather than call
up a friend and rely upon a direct,
personal connection with someone
I already know well, I have instead
shared my problems anonymously
with other people on Tumblr. My
real-life friend might at that moment be occupied by something
other than my life’s challenges, or
they might use my struggles to gossip in a way that will make me un-
comfortable. Whereas on Tumblr
the people who focus on the problems I share do so by choice.
I sometimes visit blogs written
by people I know and respect and
ask for their advice. Or I write my
own post on my own blog — giving
up the anonymity, while allowing
people who follow me to answer. I
use the network as a kind of collective wisdom.
Though I split my time between
Berlin, Germany, and Brooklyn,
New York, the people I interact
with on Tumblr are scattered from
London to Los Angeles. What
brings us together is a sense of
community built of shared inter-