According to The New York Times, Tumblr has hired a team of writers to write about the blogging platform itself.
The new team, consisting of editor-in-chief Chris Mohney and executive editor Jessica Bennett of The Daily Beast, will be responsible for writing about user-generated content on Tumblr, as well as about Tumblr users themselves.
Covering the vast amount of content available on Tumblr, and the creative people behind the tumbleogs is certainly nothing new. Here at The Next Web, we have our own weekly series, Tumblr Tuesday, where we take a behind-the-scenes look at some of the most interesting and quirky blogs on Tumblr today.
The idea of placing its own users in the limelight is also certainly nothing new, as we’ve seen with the series Posterous Spotlight, which is shared on the blogging platform’s own official blog.
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Tumblr however is creating a brand new site and hiring dedicated staff for the features. At the same time, it will be sharing the articles on the Tumblr staff blog, where it has already been highlighting notable Tumblr blogs, so it should be interesting to see how it differs from other similar initiatives.
Social media sites have all reached the point where they have begun to delve into the user-generated content that has been shared through their services. Twitter launched Twitter Stories in November highlighting the tweets that have made the most impact in the noisy twittosphere.
Other blogging platforms have taken a similar approach, with a Blogger team highlighting content in a specially created section called Blogs of Note, while the WordPress.com‘s home page features a selection of blog posts.
Tumblr’s new initiative will do far more than highlight interesting blogs, by taking on the task of actually creating new content based on what’s already available on Tumblr, and in the process, will keep its audience locked into the blogging platform longer.
The New York Times quotes an email from Tumblr vice president Andrew McLaughlin in which he says:
“Of course, it’s obviously in our self-interest as a company to surface more compelling stories about creators on Tumblr; at the same time, though, we think Chris and Jessica will be able to do so in ways that embody professional rigor and first-rate writing,”
While the move is obviously to Tumblr’s own benefit, the blogging platform deserves to be recognized for the fact that it’s turning the spotlight on its users in a far more elaborate and in-depth manner than it has in the past.
The announcement has been met with some derision, but if Tumblr Tuesday has taught us anything, it is that there is a vast amount of quality content on Tumblr waiting to be discovered.
The Next Web’s Amalia Agathou recently spoke to Buddy Media’s CEO Michael Lazerow about what 2012 might hold for Tumblr. Lazerow’s thoughts about Tumblr were entirely positive, saying that 2012 is Tumblr’s year.
Speaking about the platform itself, he said, “I don’t look at Tumblr just as Tumblr but as a two way communication vehicle, as part of a system that integrates all of your social media activity and helps you tell stories at scale.”
With its new blog, Tumblr will be showcasing those stories in a way that could set the platform apart from its competition in a new and interesting way.
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