This comes as a surprise. Aux of Cogent Metal is vehemently against webpages that have narrow layout widths. And I thought web designers are now more worried about the opposite: the wide layouts that whip out the horizontal scrollbars in resolutions narrower than 1024×768.
This is another proof that you can’t guess every possible reaction to a design pattern. In this case Aux would rather have wide layouts because it would mean a larger area to present content. But what can you do about someone just like Aux, but who believes the complete opposite?
more
Tumblr is no longer just the home of reblogged pictures, quotes, music, videos, and journal entries of friends you follow; it’s also gaining favor with the more discerning content creators in the design and technology circles, turning it into a truly professional publishing platform. This phenomenon is thanks to its relatively easy customization while keeping its interface decidedly simple.
My question is, if Tumblr’s audience is becoming more mature, should it shift from its dead-simple appeal and grow up too? David Yeiser prefers its current approach:
What’s neat about Tumblr is it’s not only a great publishing platform but a great tool for content consumption. [...] as self-publishing has changed to shorter forms and varied media the traditional feed reader has become obsolete. I shouldn’t have to click a title of a post to read a quote. [...] I think the way Tumblr aggregates and displays blog posts is the future of feed readers. Though I’m not aware of any standalone readers that take this approach.
Personally, I disagree. I follow a lot of people (and non-people) on Tumblr, producing remarkably varied content genres (e.g. XKCD Explained, 53 Weeks of UX, Sweet Home Style) with no way of filtering which ones I’d like to view at a time. Infinite scrolling in the dashboard can only take you so far in browsing ease.
Unwieldy content consumption is a familiar problem experienced on Twitter and Facebook, and by people who want more options, more control. Except there are now methods of dealing them on those sites. It’s even a big business for third party companies. On Tumblr, that remains to be seen.
Dashboard filtering options would be a welcome addition to the site. The reason is that “following” is a one-size-fits-all option when the truth is we need many.
And there lies the rub with a hosted platform, as well as platform that caters to simplicity first and foremost. Notice that as the concept of feed reading, trackbacking, and commenting are abstracted, if not replaced with Tumblr’s own conventions of dashboard reading, reblogging, liking, answering, one is forced to adhere to a closed set of standards inside its community. For a community that’s got such a wealth of content, consuming and sharing and communicating through that content but with limiting, non-standard methods is a turn off. If I link to a Tumblr post from a non-Tumblr site, will the owner of that tumblelog even know that I did?
Again, all of this wouldn’t be so bad if there were more options available, even as premium features. Right now, there aren’t.
What should Tumblr do? Should it go the WordPress.org and Identi.ca route and provide an open, self-hosted platform? Should it take some notes from the old-but-still-strong LiveJournal? (In some ways their user bases are the same.) Should it push its API more aggressively? Should we just wait and see what they’re up to, or accept that it’s really just a different culture from what we’re accustomed to?
As someone who’s enjoyed a lot of great content on Tumblr and is tempted to migrate her personal blog over there, there are a glaring number of things holding me back.
The tumblelog phenomenon is new enough that well-designed sites are still few and far between. Here are 5 unique designs that break out of the mold:
cameron.io
Well known for his Tumblr themes, Cameron makes nice use of color and different icons for each type of post:
topherchris
Great header:
tumbl.us
Nice attention to detail in the wrap around images for the dates and the subtle gradient background:
Jacob Bijani
Another site with nice use of color for different post types, in a cool wrap-around ribbon design:
Stumble Peach
A clean layout making good use of the sidebar and icons:
For more info on tumblr theme customization and all things Tumblr, check out Tumblepedia and CustomizeTumblr. Tumblr also has a listing of basic elements that are available for customization on their site.
Incidentally, I mentioned last week that one of the features that is still forthcoming in Tumblr is comment functionality. CustomizeTumblr has posted two solutions to use in the meantime.
Looking for some free Tumblr themes?
There aren’t many to choose from, but hopefully we’ll see that changing. For now, check out Cameron’s excellent set of themes, the Bus Full of Hippies theme, Silkclean at pixelspread, two at the Nikography tumblelog, and Sunday Edition by Bill Israel.
This article was written by Randa Clay. Read more about design, marketing, blogging, branding and all things creative at RandaClay.com.
*/
