In a Tuesday post on Tumblr, Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg described several business and technical hurdles to having porn on the platform, like processing payments and keeping Tumblr in the App Store. ![]() Less than a year after the porn ban, Tumblr was sold to Automattic, the company best known for the blogging platform WordPress. Tumblr had been a haven for nudity and porn (for better and worse), so naturally, users were pissed. The initial wording of the ban described rejecting “female-presenting nipples,” language that was, of course, roasted by Tumblr’s users. The 2018 porn ban came as Tumblr, owned by Verizon at the time, was struggling to avoid being removed from Apple’s App Store over child sexual abuse images. “I miss Tumblr (and I don't like Elon), so my hope is that maybe there won't be such a big difference in the size of their user bases in the future.” “I started focusing more on Twitter a little before the porn ban happened, just because there were more people on Twitter,” she told BuzzFeed News. That's exactly what happened, but it doesn't look like Tumblr is open to supporting porn communities anytime soon.However, creators like Kate who use social media to drive an audience to their paid content on OnlyFans or other sites aren’t sure they’ll make the move away from Twitter. In September this year, it launched Community Labels with the category "sexual themes," hinting that it was going to loosen its rules and would allow some adult content on the website again. As part of the settlement terms, Tumblr had to bring in an expert to review its moderation algorithms for potential bias. Earlier this year, it reached a settlement with New York City's Commission on Human Rights, which found that the ban disproportionately impacted LGBTQ+ users. Tumblr was one of the few sites that not only tolerated but seemingly embraced its sex worker and adult artist communities, so it caught considerable flak when, with little warning, it banned adult content four years ago. Tumblr also admits that the list isn't exhaustive and that further interpretation is up to the company. They also aren't allowed to post images with extreme violence and gore or any kind of content that promotes pedophilia, including images of children when the "intent of the blog is sexually suggestive." Any blog that violates those rules will be removed. In addition to the continued ban on visual depictions of sexually explicit acts, users can't post links to adult affiliate networks or anything that promotes escort or erotic services. ![]() Content with nudity and sexual themes now allowed under the new policy will also have to be labeled so that users can filter them out. Artwork considered historically significant is an exemption, so long as it's properly labeled. In its full Community Guidelines page, Tumblr explained that by "visual depictions," it means pictures, videos, GIFs, drawings, CGI and any other kind of visual media. Under its new policy, users can post images and videos with nudity, as well as text with mature subject matter and sexual themes, but they still can't post visual depictions of sexually explicit acts or any content with an overt focus on genitalia. Now, the website has updated its community guidelines so that the naked human form is once again allowed. It deleted tons of sex blogs and communities to comply with its new rule, and its already dwindling community never quite recovered since. Tumblr changed enormously in 2018 after it started blocking all adult content, reportedly because images of child sexual abuse were posted on the website.
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