A ghost stegosaurus visiting their newly discovered bones. They’re so happy you found them!
Strange Cats
POV: Your Master's thesis on the quantum mechanics of space cat is due in an hour but it's also nap time.
Once again, Tumblr manages to succeed via just being honest with their users.
I made a post back around April fool's about the crabs being so popular because the joke was that every other website tries to trick you into clicking things so they can make money from your clicks and what if instead a website just asked "please click this revenue generating crab. It is there to generate revenue. In return you will have clicked on a crab. Nothing more." And the answer to that question was "people will frantically click on that crab. They don't hate the idea of the website getting money, they hate the idea of being profited on against their will".
So Tumblr implemented actual revenue crabs. "For this much money you can fill your or someone else's dash with virtual crabs. This will have the effect of there being crabs on their screen."
And people will buy those crabs. Because yes you're spending money on something stupid and useless but it's being sold to you as "hey you want something stupid and useless?", which is a nice change of pace from every other site trying to make itself out to be something more than what it is.
Twitter is floundering with the checkmark system because it's being sold as "confirm that you are someone important and who you say you are is true", which it isn't at all right now because anyone can buy one. You're buying a useless checkmark that only says that YOU think you're important. Or, more often than not right now, you are intending to trick other people into thinking you're someone you're not.
Meanwhile, Tumblr just said "Consider this double check mark. It does nothing. You will be marking yourself as someone who paid money for a meaningless checkmark and sometimes it will randomly turn into a bunch of crabs, making the site harder to use". And the userbase is like "Well sure, that sounds delightful."
The point is, despite what all the marketing and advertising people have tried to say, painting trash gold and trying to pass it off as something better is almost never as effective as just saying "hey you want this trash?"
Why yes, in fact, I do.
I recently got a new reflective vest to use at night when I run and a group of people on bikes passed me and one of them commented on how well it works. It felt good to have confirmation that it is a good thing to have.