#rawtexts

Why Everything Suddenly Vanished + What Happens Next

so… a weird wave of moderation hit out of nowhere.

Even though Tumblr officially cleared my blog as not explicit, they also have, as of Friday: – terminated my original account @masterlouistf, – hid or suppressed a bunch of my RawTexts development posts, – made the account name RawTexts an unavailable blog name even though its not in use.

I honestly don’t know if Tumblr is rolling out another automated ban wave or updating their filters again, but the timing is very inconvenient. Even posts that were purely tech updates about RawTexts got buried after my account being marked as safe.

Because my main account is gone, I can’t post stories for now, not unless support reinstates the original blog. All my drafts, WIPs, queued chapters, tags, followers, everything: locked behind that termination.

But I will still post updates here as we ramp up to the Beta in the next couple of months.

🛠️ RawTexts isn’t cancelled. Development is still moving, the platform is still being built, and I’ll keep sharing the behind-the-scenes progress, design decisions, and dev notes right here on this new blog while we wait for tumblr support to sort things out (which I hope they do) and I will be keeping writing separate to prevent any reason to take this account down too.

I just want to keep people in the loop and avoid disappearing without explanation. If the original account is restored, stories will resume like normal. if not… well, I’ll adapt and hopefully see you on RawTexts when it's live.

Thank you to everyone who noticed things going missing and checked in, i’m not going anywhere, it’s just Tumblr being Tumblr. stay tuned.

If you’ve tried to access Rawtexts recently, you’ve likely hit a "503 Service Unavailable" error. I’ve seen the messages asking if this is expected. The short answer is: no, it wasn’t the plan. The long answer is a bit more complicated.

The last few months have been a "perfect storm" of technical catastrophes and personal burnout. I believe in total transparency with this community, so I want to break down exactly what happened, why the site is currently down, and where we go from here.

1. The Erasure of 5 Years of Work

The downward spiral started with my original Tumblr account. Without warning and without any specific or granular reason provided, Tumblr fully deleted the account.

I cannot overstate how much of a mental blow this was. That account represented five years of work, curation, and community building. To see it go down the drain in an instant, with no avenue for recovery, did a serious number on my mental health. It felt like watching a library burn down, and it made it incredibly difficult to find the motivation to keep building.

2. The Holiday Hack

As if the account deletion wasn’t enough, the technical infrastructure took a massive hit in early December.

I rarely take time off, but I was finally on holiday when the news broke about a zero-day vulnerability in React. Fate has a funny way of timing these things; while I was away, hackers managed to exploit this vulnerability, gain access to my test server, and install malware.

Security is my top priority, so there was no middle ground here. I had to fully wipe the server. While I keep a repository of all the core code, there is a significant amount of configuration, local data, integrations, and environment setups that sit locally on the server. Because of the malware, I couldn't pull or save any of that data. It’s gone.

3. Burnout and Community Pushback

Beyond the technical issues, I simply needed a break. For months, I have been working evenings and weekends, sacrificing my free time, trying to build something amazing for this community.

While so many of you have been incredible, sending supportive comments and love, there was also a loud minority. I received a fair amount of hate on my old profile telling me that Rawtexts won't work, that I am wasting my time, or scrutinizing the project for using AI tools. When you are already exhausted, that negativity hits different. It got to be too much, and I needed to step away to preserve my sanity.

4. The Trap of Feature Creep

Finally, I fell into a trap that almost all solo developers face: feature creep.

I am the sole designer, sole developer, and sole tester for Rawtexts. For a platform as big and ambitious as this, wearing all those hats is heavy. I kept trying to add "just one more thing" to make it perfect, rather than focusing on stability. The scope became unmanageable for one person to maintain alongside a full-time life.

So, what now?

The good news is: I am back.

I have dusted myself off, and I am actively working on Rawtexts again. I am rebuilding the server environment and recovering what I can.

The site is not live right now, and it might stay that way for a little while longer as I ensure everything is secure and stable. I am stripping back the feature creep and focusing on the core experience.