Tumblr continues to confuse me. As the team continues to add new features to their platform, I no longer know what Tumblr is and even more what it wants to become.

Early last week the Tumblr team announced two new features. One continues to build on its strength of making it easier to publish content to the web while the other feels like a hand forcing Tumblr to be something else. Tumblr is growing, but with these latest changes it seems like Tumblr just made the leap out of microblogging.

A great addition to the “how” of posting to Tumblr is the new call in number feature. From a phone registered with Tumblr users can record an audio post from their phone. After recording, the call is then published to the tumblelog in a matter of a few minutes.

Providing this service continues to build on what Tumblr does best by making it even simpler to post your content. Overall this is a great addition, however, Tumblr needs to drop the creepy computer voice if it still wants to considers itself “sexy as hell“.

Tumblr now provides several publishing options

Along with calling into Tumblr users now have more control on when their posts will be published. Posts now have the option to be published at a specific time, processed in a queue or saved as a draft.

Options like these have been popular on Twitter as a third party service. Many blogs also allow for this type of scheduling however there is something about this new feature being developed by Tumblr that has me questioning its future.

Over the last few iterations Tumblr has become more blog-like. From a use perspective, Tumblr no longer competes with other microblogs but instead pushes features that match up with other blogging platforms like Blogger, Wordpress and Vox. Tumblr is walking a thin line of being a robust microblog or becoming a crippled blog.

We know Tumblr is searching for a business model and needs to start focusing on premium services, but these last few updates have me questioning what Tumblr is and how to balance it with my current mix of online publishing.

Hopefully the Tumblr team comes through with some answers soon because right now I’m getting lost in the noise of new features and losing sight of Tumblr’s real advantages in the blogging/microblogging world.