# User Guidelines

  


As a global platform for creativity and self-expression, Tumblr is deeply committed to supporting and protecting freedom of speech. At the same time, we draw lines around a few narrowly defined but deeply important categories of content and behavior that jeopardize our users, threaten our infrastructure, and damage our community. For more information on how we identify content and review reports, and the actions we may take in response, see 

## What Tumblr is for:

Tumblr celebrates creativity. We want you to express yourself freely and use Tumblr to reflect who you are, and what you love, think, and stand for.

## What Tumblr is not for:

  * **Terrorism.** We don't tolerate content that promotes, encourages, or incites acts of terrorism. That includes content which supports or celebrates terrorist organizations, their leaders, or associated violent activities. 
  * **Hate Speech.** Don't encourage violence or hatred. Don't post content for the purpose of promoting or inciting the hatred of, or dehumanizing, individuals or groups based on race, ethnic or national origin, religion, gender, gender identity, age, veteran status, sexual orientation, disability or disease. If you encounter content that violates our hate speech policies, please report it.   
  
Keep in mind that a post might be mean, tasteless, or offensive without necessarily encouraging violence or hatred. In cases like that, you can always block the person who made the post—or, if you're up for it, you can express your concerns to them directly, or use Tumblr to speak up, challenge ideas, raise awareness or generate discussion and debate. 
  * **Harm to Minors.** Don't post or solicit content that features the abuse of a minor, that includes suggestive or sexual content involving a minor or anyone that appears to be a minor, or that facilitates or promotes child sexual abuse. "Content" may include photos of real individuals, illustrations, animation, or text. Posting or reblogging child sexual abuse material is a serious crime for which we have no tolerance. We report all such instances to child protection organizations and law enforcement around the world, including the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. 
  * **Promotion or Glorification of Self-Harm.** Don't post content that actively promotes or glorifies self-harm. This includes content that urges or encourages others to: cut or injure themselves; embrace anorexia, bulimia, or other eating disorders; or commit suicide rather than, e.g., seeking counseling or treatment, or joining together in supportive conversation with those suffering or recovering from depression or other conditions. Dialogue about these behaviors is incredibly important and online communities can be extraordinarily helpful to people struggling with these difficult conditions. We aim for Tumblr to be a place that facilitates awareness, support and recovery, and we will remove only those posts or blogs that cross the line into active promotion or glorification of self-harm. 
  * **Sexually Explicit Material.** Visual depictions of sexually explicit acts (or content with an overt focus on genitalia) are not allowed on Tumblr. That includes pictures, videos, GIFs, drawings, CGI, or anything similar. Historically significant art that you may find in a mainstream museum and which depicts sex acts—such as from India’s Śuṅga Empire—are now allowed on Tumblr with proper labeling.  
  
Nudity and other kinds of adult material are generally welcome. We’re not here to judge your art, we just ask that you **add a Content Label to your mature content** so that people can choose to filter it out of their Dashboard if they prefer.  
  
You have the option to add a content label when making a new post, reblogging a post, or editing an existing post. Depending on your content, you can label it as generally mature or choose a specific category such as “Sexual Themes” if your post contains sexually suggestive subject matter.  
  
Blogs which have a focus on mature content may not be eligible for certain Tumblr features, including monetization options. We need to consider the policies of our partners in the payments space, so the rules there are a bit different.  
  
For more information about this guideline, and how to appeal decisions about sexually explicit material, check out our Help Center article. 
  * **Violent Content and Threats, Gore and Mutilation.** Don't post content which includes violent threats toward individuals or groups - this includes threats of theft, property damage, or financial harm. Don't post violent content or gore just to be shocking. Don't showcase the mutilation or torture of human beings, animals (including bestiality), or their remains. Don't post content that encourages or incites violence, or glorifies acts of violence or the perpetrators. 
  * **Non-Genuine Social Gesture Schemes.** Don't participate in schemes to drive up non-genuine Follows, Likes, Reblogs, etc. Don't orchestrate or engage in "follow trains", where users are encouraged to follow lists of other users to gain more followers for themselves. Don't make bulk or indiscriminate use of messaging features, like Fan Mail or Asks, to, for example, bait Reblogs/Follows or drive traffic to your blog or website. If you want people to like you, just play it cool and be yourself. 
  * **Deceptive or Fraudulent Links.** Don't post deceptive or fraudulent links in your posts. This includes giving links misleading descriptions, putting the wrong “source” field in a post, setting misleading click-through links on images, or embedding links to interstitial or pop-up ads. 
  * **Misattribution or Non-Attribution.** Make sure you always give proper attribution and include full links back to original sources. When you find something awesome on Tumblr, reblog it instead of reposting it. It's less work and more fun, anyway. When reblogging something, DO NOT inject a link back to your blog just to steal attention from the original post. If you want to report the unauthorized posting of content you created or have a copyright for, please do so using this form. 
  * **Username/URL Abuse or Squatting.** Tumblr's usernames/URLs are meant for the use and enjoyment of all of our users. Don't squat, hoard, amass, accumulate, accrue, stockpile, rack up, buy, trade, sell, launder, invest in, ingest, get drunk on, cyber with, grope, or jealously guard Tumblr usernames/URLs. 
  * **Account Dormancy.** Use Tumblr! Use Tumblr all the time! Or at the very least, use Tumblr once a year. If you don’t, we may mark your account as dormant. Your content won't go anywhere—it'll be archived exactly as you left it—but your URL(s) will be released for someone else to use. 
  * **Spam.** Don't spam people. Don't make spammy posts, don't post spammy replies, don't send people spammy messages. Be a regular human. Don't put tags on your posts that will mislead or deceive searchers. For example, don't tag a photo of your cat with "doctor who" unless the name of your cat is actually Doctor Who, and don't overload your posts with #barely #relevant #tags. Of course, meaningful uses of tags are always fine (for example, ironic "punchline" tags that add meaning or context to a post). Don't put dubious code in your posts, like using JavaScript to cause redirects or inject unwanted ads in blogs. Don't use deceptive means to generate revenue or traffic, or create blogs with the primary purpose of affiliate marketing. Spam doesn't belong on Tumblr. 
  * **Mass Registration or Automation.** Don't register accounts or post content automatically, systematically, or programmatically. 
  * **Illegitimate Promotions.** Please see our Promotions Guidelines for requirements around contests, sweepstakes, and giveaways. 
  * **Themes Distributed by Third Parties.** To ensure the safety and stability of our blog network, it's important that themes are distributed through tumblr.com/themes. It's easy, it's secure, and any interested developer can use it to host and promote their work. Besides the inconvenience involved in using them, third-party theme repositories are often used to inject nefarious code that subjects users to spam, ads, or phishing attacks. Don't use them. Creating blogs or directories that curate themes from tumblr.com/themes is a-okay. 
  * **Copyright or Trademark Infringement.** Respect the copyrights and trademarks of others. If you aren't allowed to use someone else's copyrighted or trademarked work (either by license or by legal exceptions and limitations such as fair use), don't post it.  
  
Intellectual property is a tricky issue, so now is as good a time as any to explain some aspects of the process we use for handling copyright and trademark complaints. We respond to notices of alleged copyright infringement as per our Terms of Service and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act; please see our DMCA notification form to file a copyright claim online. Please note that we require a valid DMCA notice before removing content. Parties asserting a trademark infringement claim should identify the allegedly infringing work and the legal basis for their claim, and include the registration and/or application number(s) pertaining to their trademark. Each claim is reviewed by a trained member of our Trust and Safety team.  
  
If we remove material in response to a copyright or trademark claim, the user who posted the allegedly infringing material will be provided with information from the complainant's notice (like identification of the rightsholder and the allegedly infringed work) so they can determine the basis of the claim.  
  
We always want to make sure there is room in any copyright or trademark complaint for both parties to make their case. With regard to copyright claims, the posting user can file a DMCA counter-notification with us, as described in our Terms of Service. Counter-notifications that we determine to be valid will result in restoration of the content at issue following the required waiting period prescribed by the DMCA. With regard to trademark claims, the posting user can send us an appeal explaining their side of the situation, along with any relevant materials we should look at. A successful trademark appeal will also result in restoration of the content at issue.  
  
With regard to repeat copyright infringement, we use a three-strike system to evaluate the standing of a user's account, where, generally, each valid copyright infringement notice constitutes a strike, and three strikes results in the termination of a user's account. When a user submits a valid DMCA counter-notification, we remove the associated strike from their record.  
  
Whew. It's a complex process, but one we're proud of, and that we think strikes all the appropriate balances. 
  * **Impersonation and Non-Genuine Behavior.** Don't do things that may cause confusion between your blog and another person, organization, or company, like registering a deliberately confusing URL or pretending to be a celebrity or an elected official. Don't impersonate anyone. While you're free to ridicule, parody, or marvel at the alien beauty of Benedict Cumberbatch, you can't pretend that you're actually Benedict Cumberbatch. 
  * **Harassment.** Don't engage in targeted abuse, bullying, or harassment. Don't engage in the unwanted sexualization or sexual harassment of others. If someone is sending you unwanted messages, or reblogging your posts in an abusive way, we encourage you to be proactive. Report them, and block the hell out of them. And if someone blocks you, don't attempt to circumvent the block feature or otherwise try to communicate with them. 
  * **Privacy Violations.** Don't use Tumblr to deceptively obtain personal information. Don't post content that violates anyone's privacy, especially personally identifying or confidential information like credit card numbers, social security numbers, or unlisted contact information. Absolutely do not post unauthorized nude imagery—that is, private photos or videos taken or posted without the subject's consent. 
  * **Disruptions, Exploits, or Resource Abuse.** Our servers, and the valiant engineers behind them, work hard for you. Don't attempt unauthorized use, disruption, or exploitation of Tumblr.com or our other products and services, or otherwise abuse Tumblr's resources. 
  * **Unlawful Uses or Content.** Don't use Tumblr to conduct illegal behavior, like fraud or phishing. That should be pretty obvious to you, a decent human being. Don't use Tumblr for any kind of exchange of regulated drugs, substances, devices, goods, or weapons. Don't use Tumblr to buy them, sell them, trade them, or to share instructions for manufacturing them. This includes firearms, firearm parts, 3D-printed firearms or parts, explosives, ammunition, or anything else designed to hurt others. 
  * **Election Interference.** You may not use Tumblr to defraud nor impede the integrity of the United States Census or local, regional, or national public office elections. Bottom line: do not create or promote content designed to suppress, intimidate, or confuse voters or U.S. census participants. This includes spreading false information about how to vote, when to vote, or where to vote. 
  * **Human Trafficking and Prostitution.** Don't use Tumblr to facilitate sex trafficking, other forms of human trafficking, or illegal prostitution. If you see this activity on Tumblr, report it, and encourage victims to contact law enforcement or the National Human Trafficking Hotline at 1-888-373-7888. 



If we conclude that you are violating these guidelines, you may receive a notice via email. If you don't explain or correct your behavior, we may take action against your account. Repeat violations of our User Guidelines may result in permanent blog or account suspension. We do our best to ensure fair outcomes, but in all cases we reserve the right to suspend accounts, or remove content, without notice, for any reason, but particularly to protect our services, infrastructure, users, and community. We reserve the right to enforce, or not enforce, these guidelines in our sole discretion, and these guidelines don't create a duty or contractual obligation for us to act in any particular manner.

You can report violations of these guidelines to us directly. If you frequently submit unfounded reports, we reserve the right to suspend your ability to make reports.

You can remove your own content whenever you want, of course. If you need help doing that, you can find instructions over in our help docs.

We also reserve the right to amend these guidelines using the procedures set forth in our Terms of Service.

If you have questions or feedback, don't hesitate to let us know.

Thanks for reading all of this, by the way. Welcome to Tumblr.

## Link to Prior Versions

You will find prior versions of our User Guidelines on GitHub, which will allow you to compare historical versions and see which terms have been updated.

http://github.com/tumblr/policy/commits/master/user-guidelines.txt