Hi folks,
As a concerned Tumblr user (given the upcoming Verizon/Yahoo acquisition) and data geek, I spent the past few weeks trying to find a reliable way to backup my Tumblr blog in a portable format... I found a bunch of 2-3 year old Python or Ruby scripts, but nothing that got the job done properly. So I figured I'd write my own 😬
tumblr2json does what it says on the tin - it'll quickly and easily export your entire Tumblr blog in JSON format, all within your browser with *zero* apps to install or sketchy shell scripts to execute. What's even better is that it doesn't require login, oAuth or any of that nonsense. Enter your Tumblr username and let it work it's magic (I've even battle tested it on a blog with 12k+ posts and it spat back a 50mb JSON file without issue)
Right now it doesn't backup images (downloading gigabytes of reblogged cat gif photosets is a bit much) but I'll be considering some approaches to backing up media in the future. I'm also considering some analytics applications on top of the data set - there's a lot of interesting stuff in there. Open up the JSON file in your favorite text editor and poke around with CMD+F 🔍
Hope some people find this useful! 😊
Phishbert