I’m getting ready to give up on Tumblr entirely

I’m not going to be deleting my blog, but that’s admittedtly because I stupidly set up my shop’s blog as a sideblog, and not as its own account.  But Tumblr is doing nothing positive for me.  I’m pretty sure I’m being actively ignored by the part of the fandom I want to interact most with, and my latest post to try to find new followers was a pretty big indication that the sort of things I want aren’t going to be found on Tumblr anyway.  So, whatever.  I’m done.  It’s not fun anymore, and I’m going to try to find a way to get my sideblog moved to a primary through some form of bribery or whatever it takes.

But it’s just incredibly disheartening to look at my follower count.  I’ve got about 1000 followers, which is about 950 more than I ever had on LJ.  And yet, there are only about four or five people who even seem to care that I’m posting anything.  My social interaction on Tumblr pretty much consists of shouting something into the void, and the refreshing for an hour, going, “gee, I hope somebody sees my post this time.”  At least on WP, I know I don’t have any followers, so knowing that nobody cares is a lot easier to deal with.  But that is what it boils down to.  Nobody cares.  It’s pretty plain at this point, so I no longer care.  This post will get six views, and maybe one like from an external source, because that’s what all my posts that aren’t fic notes get.

And it’s the same with my fic, tbh.  Even worse, because I can see on the stats how many people are actually looking at it.  But the only reason the comment count on any of my fics is as high as it is is because I respond to people and try to spark up conversations.  Not that it ever works, because nobody wants to talk to me.  I want to finish these fics, but at the same time, I don’t see why I should.  If nobody cares about them, why am I bothering?  I’ve got better things to do with my time, and I’m starting to wonder why I even come back to try to finish these WIPs.  

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lol I hadn't realised that the cross-posting of fic got so garbled up. I'll be pausing IFTTT the next time I intend to post fic to my WordPress blog, so that doesn't happen again. Sorry.

Tumblr part 2

So, I changed my mind and deleted my account. It took some serious work to do, because of the sideblog, though. I managed to find out how to transfer it to a new account, and then found a really neat hack to make it almost like a primary blog. I just have to be mindful of hyphens when using that blog, but it’s over in its own place now, with its own dash that’s largely free of the kind of crap I’ve been sick of for a while. 

And I wasn’t even going to delete the blog at first, until I got some fresh, brand new perspective on why it was pissing me off so much. The only actual interaction I’ve had in the last month has been a string of anon hate that was getting more and more outrageous. Then I made the earlier post today about being fed up with Tumblr, and THAT was what it took to get any response from anybody. And that response was largely “stop complaining.”  A few people mentioned that they saw the anon posts, and asked what they could say to change my mind, but at that point, my mind was already made up. But it actually pissed me off, and I can’t believe how angry it made me. I make post after post after post trying to get people to talk to me, throwing my Skype info out there and reaching out to other people to start conversations, and nobody cares to respond until after I finally say how fed up I am with being ignored. Honestly, if 1000 people are following me, and none of them care about me until I say I’m quitting, then I want to know why the were following me to begin with. Because it certainly wasn’t anything to do with me.  Oh no, they’ll lose out on a few reblogs that everyone else has also reblogged. 

I mean. There are a few people who would respond, and they all know I’ve hated Tumblr from day one. Leaving the site wasn’t done in a move to punish or guilt anybody, but to keep me from making these screaming into the void posts, and then spending hours refreshing my dash and hoping people would have responded this time. If I’m that desperate for social interaction, then it’s time to make some changes, and getting rid of the biggest cause of my own insecurity is part of that. I know nobody will follow me over here from Tumblr, because I no nobody cares enough to bother setting up an account. But knowing I don’t have any followers makes not getting any feedback a foregone conclusion. It’s a lot less like screaming into a void, and more like just writing my thoughts down in a journal.  For similar reasons, I’m considering stopping my posts to AO3 and going back to drawer fic. I can see the 400+ subscribers to my fic. I can also see how there aren’t even close to that many people commenting. I don’t write for the comments, but it still hurts to know that this many people think so little of what I’m writing that they can’t even bother to say “good job.”  I was talking to a friend, and I think she’s absolutely right in her idea that AO3 is just as much to blame for the death of comment culture as Tumblr is, because they made it acceptable to “like” fics. Suddenly, you didn’t have to leave a comment on an LJ page and talk to that scary, scary author. And wherever the idea that authors are inherently scary comes from, I’d like to kick it. I am not the only person noticing this stuff lately, nor am I the only person to finally get fed up with it. I’ve got better things to do with my time than trying to beg interaction out of people half my age. So the tumblr’ gone. AO3 may be soon to follow.