Dan Leveille
Equalitopia Blog
Tumblr launches new tag system, #LGBTQ featured
Today, Tumblr expanded their tag system, creating a new way to discover content. Among the listed 25 “popular tags” is #LGBTQ.
The system highlights Tumblr’s popular tags and allows users to browse content among that tag. The tags are switched out periodically based popularity, and some high-traffic tags become trending tags—for example, ”Egypt” and “Libya.”
What sets this apart from systems like Twitter’s Trending Topics is that the content listed under these tags are chosen by selected “editors.” These editors are users who are chosen by a semi-automated process. According to the FAQ, Tumblr’s bot identifies users who post popular content about a topic. Users from this list are then selected to be editors. Every 1-4 weeks, editors are switched out.
The new tag system is an innovative way to discover content and crowdsource the task of featuring content, and incentivize that process.
Tumblr explains that this new feature goes around the limitation of the Tumblr Directory:
“It’s hard to organize Tumblr blogs by topic. A single one of your blogs may include your personal updates, your art, your opinions, and a YouTube video of a cat speaking Japanese, all in a single day. This has been a real limitation of the current Tumblr Directory. So, for the last few weeks we’ve been experimenting with some brand new tools for exploring Tumblr.”
Currently, editors of the #LGBTQ tag are imaylikemychardonnay, kristinnoeline, hunsonisgroovy and dannielle. Top contributors (users who have been featured the most by editors) are rising, franfine, everyoneisgay, sincerelyconcerned and fuckyeahlgbt.
This is the reason why Directory features and stickers were removed.
Rule of Journalism #264:
All opinions of Justin Bieber are newsworthy
Facebook adds new relationship statuses: civil unions, domestic partnerships
Today, Facebook added the two options to the “relationship status” section of profiles. Users are now able to specify that they are in a civil union or domestic partnership.
According to Mashable, the update is effective immediately for U.S. residents, and will be rolled out to other countries soon. These options will not appear in countries where same-sex marriage is already legal.
In an email to Mashable, a Facebook representative stated:
“This has been a highly requested feature from users. We want to provide options for people to genuinely and authentically reflect their relationships on Facebook.”
Current relationship statuses include single, in a relationship, engaged, married, it’s complicated, in an open relationship, widowed, seperated, and divorced.
Celebrate Valentine’s Day by purchasing a $3 marriage equality donation for $1
Fab.com is celebrating Valentine’s Day by “selling” $3 donations to Freedom To Marry for just $1.
Once purchased, Fab.com will make a $3 donation to Freedom To Marry on the purchaser’s behalf. The deal ends at midnight (PST) tonight.
According to the press release, “if a buyer gets three of their friends to also buy this deal, Fab.com will up their matching donation to $5 for the initial buyer. The deal ends at midnight tonight.”
Fab.com launched “The Big Gay Deal of the Day” on February 1st, a daily deal service similar to Groupon—but targeted to gays. Since its launch, the service has offered deals such as gay-themed magazine subscriptions, DVDs, vacation packages and other products.
Freedom to Marry is the United States’ leading marriage equality campaign.
Editorial disclaimer: Dan Leveille, the author of this post, is a Junior Advisor at Fab.com.
I just purchased one! :)
Traffic Jam by Reid Ewing from Modern Family! :)
Tomorrow is Theme Thursday! Reblog with your art theme recommendation! If we choose your theme, you’ll get a 3-month Premium Membership!
Do it! :D
Do Ask, Do Tell
Do Ask Do Tell, an illustration by trivophotography, in Equalitopia’s deviantART group. The piece is made with white china marker and Prismacolor pencils on 16” x 20” black textured paper.
This is my illustration to repeal “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.” I came up with the concept and stuff months before the vote, and funny that it was repealed right when I was starting to work on this.
Spirit
A photograph by I Must Be Dead Photography from Phoenix, AZ. Featured in the Equalitopia Group on deviantART.
Love this photo.
Petition to include the LGBTQ category in Tumblr’s directory recommendations
Tumblr is a great place for LGBTQ people, but until recently, we’ve been denied a feature.
Many LGBTQ blogs want to be included in Tumblr’s LGBTQ directory. They email Tumblr asking to be included (since this is the only way), and they don’t get responses. Equalitopia waited months, and after many emails, it was finally added.
You may not want to be in the directory, but others do. All blogs should have a fair chance.
Tumblr’s lead developer says:
“I didn’t want immature people to nominate their non-LGBTQ friends/enemies into it. Didn’t want to cheapen/ruin the category.”
He’s implying that “gay” is an insult, and used as an attack on an enemy.
Tumblr Support says:
“Because of the social implications of this directory, we believe it would be tremendously irresponsible for us to risk a user intentionally or accidently outing another user.”
Reblog if you want LGBTQ blogs to be included in this feature.
Equalitopia will send this post to Tumblr staff once it gets enough reblogs.
NO. What on earth would qualify anyone to be in that category? Because they’re gay? Everyone (including gays) need to stop treating gays as separate people. I’m not gay but I can respect that they’re no different than me. If Perez Hilton had a tumblr he should be put in the news section. If a gay guy writes inspirational stuff on his blog he should be recommended for inspiration not for being gay. You’re gay? Whoop-dee-fucking-doo. There’s nothing special about that. It shouldn’t be discriminated against but it shouldn’t be made into a gimmick either. Maybe we should create a White People category or a 12 year old category too.
this is so fucking stupid. if you’re going to make a category for gay people, then you need to go ahead and make a category for straight, bisexual, white, african, european, asian, australian, canadian, mexican, male, female, tall, short, etc.
if you didn’t notice, the categories are INTERESTS. not SEXUALITY, APPEARANCE, or PERSONALITY. that’s why there’s one category simply for personalities, that also stands out more than the others. to express that it’s for anyone, whether they’re gay, straight, bi, male, female, black, white, whatever. so technically, LGBTQ fits in with personalities. if they get their own category, so do the straight and bisexual people.
I disagree. None of the groups you mentioned have blogs about them. There are a lot of blogs about LGBTQ rights. It’s not just about people who ARE LGBTQ. I run an Equalitopia, and it does not fit into the “Personalities” category. Nor are many of the other top LGBT blogs. Is LGBTLaughs a personality? No. FuckYeahLGBT? No. AutoStraddle? No.
There is a large amount of LGBTQ-focused blogs. Oh, and bisexuals are already included in the “LGBTQ.”
And LGBTQ is an interest. I have an interest in LGBTQ issues and LGBTQ news.
About Dan Leveille
Dan primarily posts on Equalitopia Blog, a Tumblog covering LGBT news.
