Making the Case for Tumblr

As someone who constantly recommends the WordPress publishing platform, I’m also intrigued by other blogging platforms, particularly those that promise to be easy to use for non-technical content creators. A recent article from poynter.org makes the case for Tumblr. The article by Mallary Jean Tenore features Mark Coatney, who used to work at Newsweek and now works at Tumblr as the blogging platform’s media evangelist. His new job, he says, is to show other writers how to connect with readers, making blogging “more engaging and conversational.”

Recent media outlets that have created Tumblr accounts include The New York Times, HuffPost, and The Atlantic. Tenore and Coatney say easy-to-use Tumblr not only has all the advantages of most blogging platforms, but that it also has a stronger social aspect.

“It makes the barrier between reading something and responding to it very small, and I think that encourages people to be more conversational,” said Coatney, who worked as Newsweek.com’s special projects editor before taking the job at Tumblr. “I understand that journalists can’t spend all their time responding to readers,” he continued, “but at the same time, they can’t ignore them either, especially when the tools to interact are getting better all the time, whether it’s on Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook, or, hell, Dogster.”

To find out more, including some observations about why Tumblr was considered worthwhile even when it didn’t drive that much traffic to Newsweek.com, you can read the column at poynter.org.