Tumblr - what's old is new again?

I was struck by the New York Times article this weekend on how media companies are suddenly discovering Tumblr.

Is there anything new here, other than that media companies are about five years behind. Or maybe that Tumblr is about three years behind in actually getting a clear message out about what it is.

Tumblr and another site, Posterous, loosely fall under a genre called "lifestreaming," sort of between blogging and tweeting/texting. Steve Rubel switched his blog, MicroPersuasion, to Posterous a couple of years ago. And he posted a good synopsis of lifestreaming and why he moved from a blog.

Among other things, lifestream sites make it easier to post multimedia elements. For instance, you might send up a series of images and some will automatically create a gallery.

(Update: Here's another good Tumblr explanation from Mediaite.)

Anyhow, if you are considering going this way, there are words of warning from the Times article:

Unlike Twitter, where it is not uncommon for publishers to simply set up accounts that automatically publish links to their articles and blog posts, Tumblr requires publishers to add more commentary and interaction if they want to win favor with its community.

Lifestreaming

Well, Steve Reubel of the well-read Micro Persuasion blog has taken the plunge into "lifestreaming."

Somewhere between Twitter and blogging, lifestreaming is, to my mind, blogging for the peripatetic.

OK, it's a little more than that. It's really about being able to more quickly inject yourself and your thoughts, etc., into the ever-growing stream of online social networking/conversations. It's about "The Flow," as Stowe Boyd described it.

I have noticed that I am starting to get as many comments on this blog's posting on Facebook as on here. That's an interesting sign that has me looking at things like Posterous or Tumblr. We'll see. For now, when I write I tend to write a bit longer. But the idea of being able to manage the hub and "spokes," as Rubel puts it, through one site is interesting.

Rubel has a bit more on why he's "lifestreaming" and specifically notes that blogging just seems too slow and "needs a reboot." Since he's been at the front of documenting a lot of the changes for the past five years, it's worth paying attention.