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What is Tumblr? Founder David Karp provides insight

Posted at 8:08 AM, Jan 03, 2013
and last updated 2013-01-03 08:08:24-05

(WTVR) – His name is not yet as synonymous with social media as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerburg, but David Karp’s Tumblr is now one of the world’s most visited online destinations.

Karp is the cover story on Forbes magazine’s “30 under 30” issue.

“If Facebook is where you check in with your real-life friends and Twitter is how you keep up with current events, the Tumblr experience can be boiled down to people expressing themselves publicly,” Forbes writer Jeff Bercovici wrote in the issue.

Karp said defining Tumblr is getting more and more difficult for him to do.

“It’s a place where tens of millions of creators today make some of the most compelling content in the world and audiences all over the world, interested in very different things, show up to see that great stuff,” he told Forbes. “Tumblr, when it was three people, was all about the product and how I explained Tumblr to the world. Today it is about the team and building the team and the business and our partners and the way our whole company talks about itself out in the world, not just me.”

Based in New York, Tumblr does have offices in Richmond. Last spring, Karp spoke at VCU’s School of Mass Communications about his company.