To illustrate this post by @mayahawkse I would like to visualize to you the difference:

A post in 2023:

A post in 2014:

A zoom out of the same post:

This is what a community looks like.

See how in 2023 almost all of the reblogs come from the OP, from their few hours/days in the tag search. Meanwhile in 2014 the % of reblogs from OP is insignificant, because most of the reblogs come from the reblogs within the fandom, within the micro-communities formed there. You didn't need to rely on tags, or search, or being featured. Because the community took care of you, made sure to pass the work between themselves and onto their blog and exposed their followers to it. It kept works alive for years.

It's not JUST the reblog/like ratio that causing this issue, it's the type of interaction people have. They're content with scrolling and liking the search engine, instead of actually having a reblogging relationship with other blogs in their community.

Anyways, if you want to see more content you like, the only true way to make it happen is to reblog it. Likes do not forward content in no way but making OP feel nice. Reblogs on the other hand make content eternal. They make it relevant, they make it exist outside of a fickle tumblr search that hardly works on the best of days.

If you want more of something, reblog it.

Something I see mentioned often is "I don't have many followers, my reblog won't matter" which is untrue.

First of all, reblogging, commenting and interacting is how you start gathering your own micro community, second of all— you literally do not know how far a single reblog from you could go in the long run.

For instance, let's say you only have one person reblog from you, and that person only have one person who reblogged from them also, and so on, and somewhere ten reblogs down the line a very large blog reblogs it and boom, the post is getting more and more exposure!

You see, it does not matter if you don't have a large following so long as you cultivate a micro community with the people you do enjoy interacting daily with.

As you can see in the second picture I added, most of the reblogs were between very small groups of people, and occasionally it'll lapse into a large blog that would create a bigger reblog pool. BUT STILL. Saying that you don't have many followers and so it doesn't matter if you don't reblog is UNTRUE.

Even if someone just randomly wanders into your blog one day, it's beneficial for both sides because A. Seeing you reblog content they like might be enough for them to follow you B. They would be exposed to new content creators they didn't know previously and might also follow / reblog from them!

So yes, do not underestimate what your reblogs and words mean, just because you're not 'big' or whatever. It is not how tumblr works!!

P.S IT IS NOT CRINGE TO REBLOG 10 YEARS OLD CONTENT ON TUMBLR. YOU SEE IT. YOU LIKE IT? REBLOG IT. DOESN'T MATTER IF YOU DIG IT FROM THE DEPTHS OF HELL ITSELF. XOXO :'D <3

The notes get 0 stars in reading comprehension

I think so much of the outlook over fandom would change if many people treated it like it is: a goddamn hobby.

A fandom group is no better nor more revolutionary than a knitting club. It can replicate any real world biases and discriminations and it can also be used to raise money/group people towards causes. It can foster connections that will turn to actual real political action or it can just be a gathering of people who don't know much about each other outside of it.

It can be lovely to experience when you're surrounded by a lovely group and it can be hell when the group is full of cattiness and pettiness . It can be inclusive or it can be exclusive when you're surrounded by bigotry.

Because it's a group of people - it's going to have problems. And when there's a conflict or people are pointing shit out, it needs to be solved so its members aren't spit out in the sake of "avoiding drama". Because it's a group of people, it's not automatically changing the world in a blaze of self grandeur. Because it's a group of people with a common hobby, it can impact its members lives for the better and give them a space to express themselves.

Fandom is a goddamn knitting club. It's not this inherent great, subversive force of good nor this den of evil that's traumatisizing the children. Chill out.

I would point out that some of the worst online conflicts have occurred in knitting groups, and also, women were knitting in front of the guillotines in the French Revolution.

I think the OP vastly underrates the potential for revolution in fandom and in knitting groups :)

Aight, I woke up with no patience today so here we go.

With this post I am NOT saying knitting groups are some peaceful places where no conflict happens or that a gathering of people can't be a force of good. I say that, explicitly, multiple times in the post. Please do read.

What I meant with the original comparisom is: nobody, ABSOLUTELY NOBODY joins a knitting group expecting to solve imperialism. You do because it's a fun hobby. That's it.

Can this group of people who came togheter for a hobby end up organising to solve a problem in their community? For sure. Is this expected or required? Fuck no. Do people look at the grandmas knitting in the corner and go 'damn, nona, why aren't you solving world hunger instead of discussing patterns'? NO. Because IT'S A HOBBY. It'd be silly and plain performative to expect otherwise.

I cannot stress this enough as a Latin American person from the Global South: y'all first worlders are obsessed with consumer activism and the idea that you, individual, can solve the problem's aches on your own. You're constantly thinking about the big fucking picture and it constantly shows how many of yall don't have a tradition of collectivism and local activism. And because you don't know how the fuck people do activism, you think activism it's some kind of funky identity that must show in everything you consume, including fandom. You think changing the world is some painful, glorious thing and your hobbies should reflect that. They don't.

Let me tell you the secret to activism. Find a concrete, small material need in your community, find a group of people who also wanna solve it. Then try. It won't be glorious, it won't be easy. It's slow, steady, boring material help. Ant work.

Sometimes it's difficult to balance the work with everyday life so you may bow out for a bit then come back. That's how it goes.

I'm not underestimating the power of change (or chaos) a group of people can have. It's collectives, groups of people, united to solve concrete material problems what helps. I'm just saying: nobody expects fandom to solve, idk, lead poisoning just as nobody expects a knitting group to solve british neocolonisation.

treating every korok I find extra gently to make up for all the war crimes 💔

ALT

Jack Gilbert, from Collected Poems; "Waking at Night"

@pscentral event 16: pride colours

"I never won't love her. never."
shelby goodkind and toni shalifoe + the lesbian flag

Implicit storytelling in two tweets:

Yeah. They did that. I bet the ‘clarification’ came as a result of some strong legal threats.

So be aware in the coming weeks that if your favorite actor reportedly says something shitty about the strike that makes your blood boil? Check the sources. There’s going to be a lot of uh, spin in the news.

Ask a community organiser: can you organise with Fran Drescher as president of SAG-AFTRA even though she's an antivaxxer? On broad based organising versus issue based organising.

Friendly reminder that unions are more effective at reducing workplace inequality than any corporate sensitivity training program.

This was the first I've heard of this but apparently SAG-AFTRA would like cosplayers not to dress up as characters from Live Action media

Sources:

1. Klaudia Amenábar on twitter
2. Estar Guars Tia on twitter
3. SAG-AFTRA's guidelines for influencers