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Tumblr and Wordpress to Sell Users’ Data to Train AI Tools (www.404media.co)

submitted 8 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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this could not be timed worse for Tumblr which is in huge hot water with its userbase already for its CEO breaking his sabbatical to ban a prominent trans user for allegedly threatening him (in a cartoonish manner), and then spending a week personally justifying it increasingly wildly across several platforms. the rumors had already been swirling that this would occur, but this just cements that they were correct

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[–] [email protected] 43 points 8 months ago (12 children)

For any Tumblr users here, this has already rolled out completely unannounced and is opt-in by default. You need to manually opt out, which can only be done on the desktop website. Odds are good that your data is already being sold to Midjourney and used to train their models.

To do so, click on your blog on the sidebar, click on Blog Settings on the other sidebar on the right, scroll down to the Visibility section, and turn the "Prevent third-party sharing for [your blog]" toggle to ON, not off. If you have any sideblogs, you'll need to manually do this for each of them as well. It's per blog and not account-wide.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (4 children)

I was able to do it from the app and it was already on. I don't remember turning it on, so it might be default?

Edit: Just remembered that I did update the app today, so you might need to do that first.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 8 months ago

it's also at blog settings > visibility on desktop

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

They made an announcement at some point after flipping the switch that noted that some people would be opted out by default based on their blog settings. I think if your blog is set to mature or has certain search parameters turned off already.

It wasn't on for me or several artists I sent messages to who hadn't even heard that this had happened, and the general discourse around it was pretty clearly upset about it not being opt out by default.

They must've updated the app; at the time I wrote that you couldn't do it through the app.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

Ah, gotcha. Thanks for the extra info!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

I've found out that even in Wordpress is opt-out Wordpress setting for AI opt-out

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I hadn't logged in a while and it was on, weird

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I mean, I'll take that as a good point in Tumblr's favor.

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