story by Lindsey Valdiviez, graphic by Shaeffer Smith
“So I’m writing this story about the STA Tumblr page, and I don’t really know how to write it…”
“Oh my gosh, that thing is so funny! Do you know who it is?” junior Lauren Nagle says.
“Nope…That’s the problem with the story.”
“Oh…I wish I knew who it was. Can I get on your phone and look at it right now?”
Nagle takes my phone, goes to the internet and types in to the search bar www.stalife.tumblr.com.
What follows is a fit of laughter from Nagle and her friends as they gather around my phone and browse through the posts of “the Tumblr page.”
“What are you guys all laughing about?” junior Savannah Trujillo asks from across the room.
“The Tumblr page,” Nagle replies.
“Oh, lemme pull that up on my phone real quick”
“OH MY GOD” Nagle shouts.
“What?” Truijillo asks.
“What is going on Nagle?” junior Madi Kintzle questions.
Nagle shows her friends the phone screen, displaying a video clip of Yzma from “Emperor’s New Groove” stroking her eyelids. The posts reads “When I ask Ms. Wallerstedt anything, she’s like…” Simply put, Nagle was dying of laughter.
“Oh my God! Ms. Wallerstedt actually does that though,” Nagle says as she continues laughing while her friends peruse the posts on each other’s phones.
#STAlife
At 10:52 p.m. on Aug. 18, the anonymous blogger of the #STAlife Tumblr page created their first post. By 12:31 a.m. on Aug. 19, ten other posts had been created.
But it was not until 9:47 p.m. on Aug. 19 that senior Janie Thompson posted a link to www.stalife.tumblr.com to her Facebook page. It got 9 likes. An hour later, senior Menley Brennan shared Thompson’s link to her wall, which received six likes. Aug. 19 was the day that “the tumblr page” officially surfaced to the STA community.
According to Wikipedia.com, Tumblr is a “microblogging platform and social networking site” that “allows users to post multimedia and other content to a short-form blog.” In other words, bloggers can attach either pictures, animated pictures or videos to the words in their post. The #STAlife Tumblr has 74 posts, 58 of them from August, 11 created in September and five made in October. These 74 posts feature the gamut of laughable and entertaining things at STA. From capitalizing on the teacher’s quirks to evaluating the daily happenings at the Academy, the popularity of the “tumblr page” and it’s posts has caused anyone who has seen it to ponder “Who is the blogger?”
The Suspects
Everyone’s heard of it. Everyone wants to know. Everyone giggles as the pictures come to life on their computer screen as they read the witty adjunct note. This is the #STAlife Tumblr page, created and updated by an anonymous user with a knack for making the little things at STA absolutely hilarious. The key word here being anonymous.
“Hey Serenity, what is she interviewing you about?” junior Clare Mitchell shouts from across the hallway as I’m interviewing senior Serenity Wallace.
“About the Tumblr,” Wallace replies.
“Is it you?”
Wallace shakes her head no.
“Come on Serenity!” Mitchell says.
“I’M NOT THE TUMBLR!” Wallace starts punching the floor in frustration.
“Who is it then?”
“Dude, I honestly don’t know.”
“Do you think it’s Menley [Brennan]?” Mitchell asks.
“No it’s not Menley. She is like frustrated with it. People keep asking her. And it’s not Rachel [Tovar] either.”
“Rachel, what do you think about people accusing you?”
“Well, it’s part flattery, and part like, get away from me,” Tovar said. “It’s like getting annoying.”
“It could be you.”
“Really?” Tovar questions.
“I mean…”
“Are you sure it’s not me?”
What students think
“Did you see that post on the Tumblr page the other day?” a freshman asks while crossing the Quad.
“No, what did it say?” her friend replies.
“It was like, ‘Whenever my advisor brings us food’ and then these two people dancing.”
“That page is seriously like the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. Like I was crying the other day while reading it.”
Students have shared it on each other’s Facebook walls. People have reblogged and liked the individual posts. Students type in stalife.tumblr.com into the internet browser on their smartphones to share the sensation of the posts. Even alumnae have shared it on their Facebook walls. No one can deny it. It’s a phenomenon at STA and it’s funny. But does the fact that nobody knows who it is make it funnier?
In this case, the cliche “secrets secrets are no fun, secrets secrets hurt someone,” is invalid. In fact, almost the opposite has happened with the Tumblr page.
“I think it’s so cool that we don’t know who it is because it has been kept a secret for so long,” senior Hailey Waldenmeyer said.
“I think the fact that [the Tumblr page] is anonymous makes it funnier cause it’s fun to think about who it might be,” senior Sarah Kane said.
“I think that it’s so weird that they’re not coming forward because it’s so funny,” senior Nicole Sakoulas said.
“I mean whoever it is, they’re like my new favorite person,” Kane said. “I just want to tell whoever it is, to not stop posting. Ever.”
The Tumblr sometimes mentions names of STA students, including Kane.
“You know that there’s a post about you, don’t you Sarah?”
“Stop, you’re making me red! But yeah I’ve seen it,” Kane said.
“What was your reaction?”
“Well, I was really happy when I saw it because it was so funny. I felt honored.”
What administration thinks
Why would any social networking site be a concern in the first place? In the 2011-2012 school year, four Twitter accounts were created and maintained by anonymous users. During mid-day announcements, President Nan Bone requested that the accounts including the STA seal as a profile picture be taken down. However, according to the Student Press Law Center, the administration has no legal right to force a student to delete the #STAlife account. A representative of the Student Press Law Center wrote to the Dart in 2012, saying:
“School officials have close to zero legal power to require that a student remove a private account or a Facebook page, personal blog, individual tweets, web site, etc. posted outside of school, especially if the material is otherwise lawful (not libelous, copy-right, or obscene, etc.).”
“Have you heard of of the STA tumblr page?”
“Tumblr page, what’s that?” Mrs Hoecker asks.
“Oh, you mean that funny one?” president Nan Bone asks.
“Yeah, that’s the one,” I answer.
