Tumblr: 'We're pretty opposed to advertising'
latimesblogs.latimes.com
The LA Times does a quick take with David Karp.
latimesblogs.latimes.com
* They've raised a decent amount of money, which means they can't stay a strictly small 37 signals type company.
* 4,000 for virtual stickets isn't too encouraging.
* The themes are a nice revenue stream, but I don't think it's enough to keep them going.
* They've nixed premium accounts which could have been nice.
* They're 100% opposed to ANY form of advertising, even something that's innovative. I don't think they should be doing adsense, but I think there's actually room here for something innovative. They have an interesting audience and there's a certain sense of style on tumblr blogs. They could do advertising that doesn't suck.
Tumblr has done an outstanding job of building a community both on and off the web. They host and sponsor events in New York all the time, and they foster quite a creative harbor for creative individuals. That said, what I think tumblr will pursue for future funding involves tapping into that pool of creative talent.
Quite a few tumblrs have signed book deals, and if anything, I think tumblr could quite possibly end up partnering with publishing houses, and other mainstream outlets. In fact, they just recently had a partnership with Cartoon Network (through TimeWarner) to integrate cartoon characters of some new program into the design of their theme garden for a week.
Advertising isn't and shouldn't be a revenue option for every single web startup out there.
StackOverflow got caught with a model that didn't work for them and pivoting wasn't super smooth.