Karen Latchana Kenney - David Karp: The MasterMind Behind Tumblr

For Nicholson, my personal technology guru

Text copyright 2013 by Lerner Publishing Group, Inc.

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The images in this book are used with the permission of: Don Emmert/AFP/Getty Images,
pp. 2, 26; Guy Calaf/Bloomberg via Getty Images, p. 6; http://project.ioni.st/, p. 8;
Thomas Northcut/Photodisc/Getty Images, p. 10; iStockphoto.com/GYI NSEA, p. 11; Robert
Nickelsberg/Getty Images, p. 13; Cuckoos Nest/Hanna Barbera/Wang Films/Kobal Collection/Art
Resource, NY, p. 14; Chester Higgins Jr./The New York Times/Redux, pp. 15, 17, 29, 34;
Jim.henderson/Wikimedia Commons, p. 16; Toshifumi Kitamura/AFP/Getty Images, p. 18;
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Picture Service, pp. 22, 24, 30, 31; Joe Corrigan/Stringer/Getty Images, p. 27; Rabbani and
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Front cover: Don Emmert/AFP/Getty Images.

Main body text set in Rotis Serif Std 55 Regular 13.5/17. Typeface provided by Adobe Systems.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kenney, Karen Latchana.

David Karp : the mastermind behind Tumblr / by Karen Latchana Kenney.

p. cm. (Gateway biographies)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 9781467712859 (lib. bdg. : alk. paper)

ISBN 9781467712866 (PDF ISBN)

ISBN 9781467759755 (Audisee ISBN)

1. Karp, David, 1986 2. Web site development industryNew York (State)New
YorkBiographyJuvenile literature. 3. Computer programmersNew York (State)New
YorkBiographyJuvenile literature. 4. Young businesspeopleNew York (State)
New YorkBiography. 5. Tumblr (Electronic resource)HistoryJuvenile literature.
6. EntrepreneurshipNew York (State)New YorkJuvenile literature. 7. Internet industry
New York (State)New YorkBiographyJuvenile literature. I. Title.
HD9696.82.U63N49 2013
338.761006752092dc23 [B]

2012038057

Manufactured in the United States of America

1 DP 12/31/12

C ONTENTS

Karp speaks his mind about
the Internet and blogging at a
2011 conference in New York.

T he idea had been brewing in David Karps mind for
a year or so. Blogs were such an investment of time. New blogs were being created every day, but many were also abandoned quickly after. The big, blank text box was a little overwhelming to nonwriters. How would they fill it every day? What would they write about? It was a commitment to maintain and update a blog. Not everyone was up for that.

A shorter form of blogging would be better, Karp thought. And a flexible form with a simple, sleek design would be even betterone that could include a photo, a video, a chat, a song or an audio clip, or a short message. What Karp was really thinking about was a tumblelog, a type of short-form blog that is much more than Twitter and far less than Facebook.

Karp had been inspired by a tumblelog called project.ioni.st. It was a blog that was about sharing , not publishing. Its editors put up whatever they thought was cool: a quote from Oscar Wilde, a song by Nina Simone,

The quotes and images on
the tumblelog called
project.ioni.st (left) inspired
Karp to create Tumblr.

a photograph of a
sea creature by Paul Nicklen. It was like
an online scrapbook
of what interested
the editors the most. Looking through it gave the reader a
peek into the editors thoughts, interests, and experiences. Little
or no commentary
was needed. The only
context was the author.

How absolutely beautiful, Karp wrote.

Karp had been building his own tumblelog for six months. He tweaked it and worked out the bugs. And then he realized: the blog tools he created wouldnt be that
hard to make available for others to use. So when there was a two-week lull in Karps Web consultant business
in October 2006, he decided to go for it. He would build
a tumblelog that could be used by the masses. It would