Tumblr's War on Context

Hey! Tumblr! There is this thing called 'context' that adds value to things.

Now if I was on some sort of amateur porn site , I'd expect a random gibble of images presented without sense, provenance or attribution.
When I browse pictures on an multimillion dollar website/brand, I expect  a little more.

Context has many parts, not the least of which is provenance. Reblogging does horrible things to provenance.
If I'm looking a a picture of a mysterious redhead* and I'd like to Know More, it does not help me to know that jokersspuzzlepalace reblogged this from drunkenamnesiacphotos because following the linkage to 'there' merely tells me that they
reblogged it from skeletorhatesmankind
who reblogged it from minddefyingmadness1234
who reblogged it from downtherabbitholeoftimewasteingsuck
who reblogged it...
Recursion is a cool idea, but not in my webpages.And it suggests the scary possibility that at least half of Tumblr is just robots hitting 'reblog'.
...Cue refrain of 'Cotton-Eye Joe': "Where does it come from, wheres does it go..."


 Why not do something daring, something unthinkable in today's data blizzard: why not link to where the photo came from the first time.
I understand that this is not going to be a cures-all solution, but in this world of everything staying on the damn cloud, at least a pointer to where the photo originally entered the datasphere would be really useful for those browsers of the Net who actually like a side order of information with their data salad.

And while we're on the topic of your UI, lets just remark that:
Myspace already proved that a million monkeys arranging their own webpage elements would produce statistically similar arrangements. Mathematically averaging all of Myspace would give you a array of images and text that fills the screen without form or logic. Much like your 'Wall of TV Madness' mode of showing all posts. Its a cool layout when filling the space behind a brooding villain, but its significant to note that all villains shown with those TV walls are invariably mad.

Posting is a linear process, a sequence of points. And when those points are wrapped around a page that can (faux) infinitely scroll, this does not aid quick comprehension. Its like looking at  clay tablets from before they invented punctuation, or for that matter, margins. We've only had four thousand years of designing layouts, guys. Go look at some Egyptian wall paintings, at the very least. I'm sure many tumblrers would love being portrayed in Pharaonic motif. Skeletorhatesmankind** certainly would.
  I never thought that anyone would bother expanding the Myspace DIY Complication Kit (which had been beta tested on Geocities, back in the day...).
Extending this concept to the hyperlinks themselves is madness, and strikes at the very root of hypertext.
And despite what the Undead Ghost of Franz Kafka is telling your designers in between the glasses of absinthe he keeps paying for, this is not the Next Good Idea.

I leave it as an exercise for a clever web monkey to generate the code for a circular reblog.

EDIT : (this creates a 'circular reblog monkey')

* I'm using this example, because if I said ' a picture of a fantastic machine', everyone would still think " O, he's just whining about porn"

** I can't believe this nick isn't taken. Also, the spellchecker on Firefox wants to turn 'skeletorhatesmankind' into 'statesmanlike'. Kind of terrifying.