The Hotdog Laserhouse

Well played, Tumblr tech support

Ryan Bloom - Jan 31 07:13 am (EST)
Why is the field to enter text so small now? Why would I constantly want to see my dashboard in the background while I type? It can be very distracting having to see animated gifs at the bottom of my screen loop constantly while trying to concentrate on writing something. Why are all of the options hidden behind a hundred tiny little buttons just so you can fulfill some weird goal to have everything all on one screen at the same time? Why should that be important? You can say I just need time “to learn it”, but the last one was clear and readable and everything made sense immediately without having to figure out “oh, I need to hover over the tweet icon for 1.5 seconds for this dialog window but I can’t click it because that turns off tweeting this post and very little about the page actually communicates that, I just have to infer it through trial and error”. Why is that better than forwarding to a separate enclosed page where I can concentrate? It’s like trying to write a paper in a noisy living room versus going to the nice, quiet, secluded study. Did you ever consider that? I really hate this internet fad of trying to put all functions on the same page - it’s like flexing for the crowd; it looks cool but ultimately doesn’t accomplish anything useful. Because let me tell you something: having to load in to the dashboard every time I click to edit a post from my main Tumblr page is absolutely, indefensibly ridiculous. I want to correct a typo or edit some wording and I have to sit there while 75mb-150mb of completely unrelated images loads in the background. THAT’S smart design, right? (No, it’s not.)

I was really enjoying using Tumblr as a universal scratch pad where I could dump text and have easy access to it across all computers that are connected to the internet, but it feels absolutely stupid doing that on this new design, where the text window is SO SMALL. Nothing about this feels like an improvement in any way shape or form, it just feels like a bunch of coders patting themselves on the back for making all of this dynamic HTML. This is not what I want, and the sooner you change it back (or change it to something that makes more sense) the better.

Tess (Tumblr Support) Jan 31 08:54 pm (EST)
Hi Ryan,

Thanks for sending us your feedback on post forms. We really appreciate the time you took to write it out so clearly, and we’ll share your impressions with the rest of our team.

Please let me know if there’s anything else I can help you with.

Thanks,
Tess

I’m still not entirely sure anything I said had any meaning to anyone that matters over there, but at least they’re putting up a reasonable facsimile of caring.

If you’re some kind of stalkerish weirdo I have filled out more information in the “Who Is This” page.

http://blazehedgehog.tumblr.com/who

I should probably drop the whole third person tone of the page but it started out as just information I copied from the Sonic 2006 Endurance Race page.

I am thinking of filling this Tumblr out more with the eventual goal of making my old website just redirect here. That means writing articles here on Tumblr about my games and such. I suppose download links could still redirect to the Letsvideogame.com server, though.

What do you guys think?

The Waltz of Tumblr Tech Support

Me: “Okay, so, I tried to upload this video and for some reason when it’s done uploading it just forwards me to a blank page with nothing in it.”

Tumblr Support: “We’re sorry to hear that. Are you sure it’s not a problem with your browser, router, or operating system? Try these solutions and get back to us.”

Me: “I have attempted your solutions and the problem still persists. I was able to post a video just fine yesterday, and the video I want to post today is using identical encoding settings. I’ve also tried in both Firefox and Internet Explorer, with and without add-ons enabled, etc. I’ve also tried uploading a third, unrelated video, and that forwards me to a blank page, too.”

Tumblr Support: “Have you tried using an MP4 video codec?”

Me: “I always use MP4. I even tried two separate MP4 codecs, H.264 and XVID. Both end in the same result.”

Tumblr Support: “Are the files under 100mb in size? That can be a problem. If they’re over 5 minutes, they might not process, either.”

Me: “I am absolutely sure, yes.”

Tumblr Support: “Have you tried using an MP4 video codec?”

Me: “Uh, yeah. I just said I—”

Tumblr Support: “Okay, well, it’s probably best if you send us the effected files so we can analyze them. I have created a Dropbox folder for you to place the videos in.”

[Email received: “David has invited you to use the Multimedia_Public Dropbox folder”]

Me: “Okay, the videos have been uploaded to the Dropbox folder, here’s what they do.”

Tumblr Support: “What dropbox?”

Me: “…The dropbox you made for me.”

Tumblr Support: “If you need to send us files, please use dropbox.”

Me: “But I just did!”

Tumblr Support:”Please provide us links to these files.”

Me: “Okay, here’s links to the dropbox folder you made for me.”

Tumblr Support: “Dropbox says we do not have permission to access these files.”

Me: “But this is a folder made by you for me! Look, Tumblr Support Agent ‘David’ even has permissions to access this folder!”

Tumblr Support: “Please provide working links to the files in question.”

Me: “Fine, whatever, look. I’ve moved the files to a completely different public folder, here are public links to the files in question.”

Tumblr Support: “Did you try encoding these videos in an MP4 codec? Are they under 100mb? Maybe they’re too long, they should be under five minutes in length.”

Nice job, Tumblr tech support

So I had a video I wanted to upload a few days ago. It was a silly sort of impulse upload, based on something somebody had shown me on Twitter, but it wouldn’t post. When the video was done uploading, it would send me to a blank page. I tried more than one video, same result.

I contact Tumblr tech support about it. For three days, we run around in circles (sometimes literally being asked the same question multiple times) with questions that basically amount to “Are you sure it’s plugged in?” Yes, I’m sure it’s plugged in. This isn’t a problem on my end.

Finally, I’m invited to send them the video files in question via Dropbox so they can analyze them and figure out what’s wrong. I respond to tell the guy that the video files have been uploaded to their dropbox, and instead I get a completely different tech support person in response to me, telling me, and I quote:

Please feel free to send in any relevant files for review and testing. If you have larger files, as in your case, you can try using dropbox or another file hosting service and give us the link to that.

Wow, thanks. I’ll be sure to do that.