I've semi-disengaged from reddit and expect only to use the site less in the future but I dislike this argument. Reddit has been my social and internet home for over ten years at this point. I...
I've semi-disengaged from reddit and expect only to use the site less in the future but I dislike this argument. Reddit has been my social and internet home for over ten years at this point. I feel connected to it as much as if it was a brick and mortar place in real life. A decent portion of who I am as a human being was shaped there. You could collect my comments there and essentially build a memoir out of them.
Just dropping that cold turkey is hard. It's like leaving a part of yourself behind. I begrudge no one who stays yet still makes their displeasure known.
Thank you for saying this. I haven't dropped reddit "cold turkey" (even though I'm very happy to be spending my time on Tildes instead,) and I don't necessarily think it's because I'm "addicted"...
Exemplary
A decent portion of who I am as a human being was shaped there. You could collect my comments there and essentially build a memoir out of them.
Just dropping that cold turkey is hard. It's like leaving a part of yourself behind. I begrudge no one who stays yet still makes their displeasure known.
Thank you for saying this.
I haven't dropped reddit "cold turkey" (even though I'm very happy to be spending my time on Tildes instead,) and I don't necessarily think it's because I'm "addicted" to reddit (the common insult being thrown around there nowadays.) Certainly, old habits die hard, and I'm not claiming that some people don't struggle with an addictive relationship to reddit. I just don't think it's reasonable to prescribe that issue to everyone who "left" reddit and still stops by every now and then. When I visit reddit nowadays, I'm not making some kind of an ethical statement or failed attempt at a protest - I'm just slowly saying goodbye to something I loved for a very long time.
I joined reddit when I was a teenager. A child. When I joined reddit I was a sad, lost teenager with $47 to my name, and now I'm 31 years old with a mortgage and a retirement plan. Reddit has been there, practically every day, that whole time. And for most steps of my adult life, reddit has been a resource. When I was 20, I looked to reddit to understand the basics of a 401k. When I was 25, I searched reddit: "purchasing a first home." After that, I browsed home improvement subreddits. I used reddit, at least partially, to figure out how to retire. So, in a small, indirect way, it will literally be with me until I die. That's how integral reddit was/is for many people's lives.
Other social media sites have come and gone, and I've joined them at times (like to receive/send TikToks to real life friends who prefer that platform,) but reddit has always been my default. It's just always been there, and it's strange to imagine my life without it, even though it's a silly website where I spent a small portion of my days.
I'm at a place that is far, far beyond "protesting" reddit. In fact, even mid-June when all this started, I wasn't "protesting" when I expressed my displeasure with the direction of reddit, I was just beginning my process of letting go of it. I don't want it to go, I genuinely loved reddit. But it's happening regardless.
But I have no goals of "saving" reddit or reversing the changes that have been made. Anyone with their head on straight could tell almost immediately that the company was not interested in keeping us around, and that none of the requests regarding APIs or accessibility would be resolved. For me, it's over. Things have changed. It was bound to happen. But I feel no qualms about checking in on the communities I grew to love and respect over the years, at least the ones that I haven't found any alternative space for.
I don't care how reddit does or does not benefit from any of my actions. That's no longer of concern to me.
It's very interesting because I felt the same when I found reddit but simply have a completely different perspective of the internet. I still feel 99% of what I do here on the internet is...
I joined reddit when I was a teenager. A child. When I joined reddit I was a sad, lost teenager with $47 to my name, and now I'm 31 years old with a mortgage and a retirement plan. Reddit has been there, practically every day, that whole time.
It's very interesting because I felt the same when I found reddit but simply have a completely different perspective of the internet. I still feel 99% of what I do here on the internet is ephemeral and I'm fine with that. I don't really trace back and reminiscence on my old GameFaqs comments from 2007 (if I could find them to begin with). And I carried that as I drifted from site to site. Sites slow down or outright die, or I change and desire something different.
No discredit to your experience. I just simply wanted to state an alternate anecdote on why it's easy (relatively) for me to quit a website compared to others. It's all a tool rather than a true sense of community, and I remember older sites at best like I'd remember some old action figures.
I'm certainly not blaming people who find a sense of community at Reddit and want to continue to use it. Obviously not everyone is willing or able to cut the cord. It's addictive, and the only way...
I'm certainly not blaming people who find a sense of community at Reddit and want to continue to use it. Obviously not everyone is willing or able to cut the cord. It's addictive, and the only way that I was able to stop using it was because 99% of my usage was mobile and they removed that experience from me (and I'm not willing to put up with their absolute shit app). Other people have different criteria or thresholds on behavior change, and that's all good.
I'm just commenting on the term 'protest'. Closing subreddits was a protest. Making them NSFW so that Reddit couldn't monetize them was a protest. Not visiting the site is a protest. But using their website to post about your displeasure is not a protest, it's just complaining. It would be like protesting Starbucks by going to one, buying a coffee, grabbing a table and talking about how much you hate Starbucks.
Honestly the main reason i quit cold turkey was the spez AMA. Before that i planned to keep using it on PC. But i might have to come back to it in a couple of weeks when the new Path od Exile...
Honestly the main reason i quit cold turkey was the spez AMA. Before that i planned to keep using it on PC.
But i might have to come back to it in a couple of weeks when the new Path od Exile patch drops because it's kinda irreplaceable for finding out about hidden mechanics, undocumented changes and general tips about the new content
Exactly the same for me. That whole shit show, and Spez's continued attempts to slander Apollo's developer completely soured my opinion on Reddit to the point that I no longer wanted to be a part...
Honestly the main reason i quit cold turkey was the spez AMA. Before that i planned to keep using it on PC.
Exactly the same for me. That whole shit show, and Spez's continued attempts to slander Apollo's developer completely soured my opinion on Reddit to the point that I no longer wanted to be a part of it. I logged out over a month ago and haven't been back.
I'm so happy to be in a discord (really completely unrelated to the game) where there's a PoE guild and I can get my info from there... I've unsubscribed from the poe subreddit several times so...
I'm so happy to be in a discord (really completely unrelated to the game) where there's a PoE guild and I can get my info from there... I've unsubscribed from the poe subreddit several times so far, and everytime it happens faster in a league, because it's such a toxic hole.
Every sub around a game is toxic on reddit, even the minecraft one. The EFT sub was the worst one I've ever been a part of, and for only a short period.
Every sub around a game is toxic on reddit, even the minecraft one.
The EFT sub was the worst one I've ever been a part of, and for only a short period.
EFT doesn't ring a bell, what game is that? I've actually found smaller game communities to be fairly good - Voxel Tycoon, Shapez, etc. Since I've scaled back my reddit use to a single sub I...
EFT doesn't ring a bell, what game is that?
I've actually found smaller game communities to be fairly good - Voxel Tycoon, Shapez, etc. Since I've scaled back my reddit use to a single sub I haven't really been seeing if there have been changes there... guessing not
Escape From Tarkov. If you know anything about the game, I probably don't need to explain why a community based around it would be extra toxic. If you don't, good for you honestly, stay away from it.
Escape From Tarkov.
If you know anything about the game, I probably don't need to explain why a community based around it would be extra toxic.
If you don't, good for you honestly, stay away from it.
It's actually impressive how horrible the app is. I tried it out because, as others have said, it's really hard to quit after 10+ years there, but it's actually unusablely bad. They should be...
It's actually impressive how horrible the app is. I tried it out because, as others have said, it's really hard to quit after 10+ years there, but it's actually unusablely bad. They should be embarrassed.
I think anything that makes the site worse to use could be a form of protest. That's essentially what the John Oliver protests in /r/pics were doing. Acknowledging that there wasn't any real...
I think anything that makes the site worse to use could be a form of protest. That's essentially what the John Oliver protests in /r/pics were doing. Acknowledging that there wasn't any real avenues of protest, so they were going to just make the overall user experience worse and hurt engagement.
I'm over 30 and have basically been a habitual Reddit user for half my life. Though I have found that it has become a much more unhealthy habit over the past five or so years, driven more by...
I'm over 30 and have basically been a habitual Reddit user for half my life. Though I have found that it has become a much more unhealthy habit over the past five or so years, driven more by addiction than anything. The fun internet subculture is gone, the quality of discussion has dropped to pathetic levels, and there just isn't much left.
I haven't really used it since they threw the switch on the API changes, though I'm very annoyed that communities for hobbies and things persist there when they belong on independent forums instead of the garbage dump Reddit had become. We'd be better off if Reddit just disappeared and the damage they did to niche forums could heal.
Oof. I've literally done this without a second thought. I'll remember this next time a vegan dish is offered to me.
But no one ever says any of that, it's always "you're either a vegan or a carnivore." Do you know how many people just straight up believe they can't have vegan or vegetarian food because they aren't vegan or vegetarian? I've offered vegan food to someone and they're like "No thank you, I'm not vegan." It's like what? You don't have to be vegan to eat this.
Oof. I've literally done this without a second thought. I'll remember this next time a vegan dish is offered to me.
On that note - I'm a "fake vegetarian" and have eliminated most meat from my diet. I wish more people would see things as a scale. Less meat is more better.
On that note - I'm a "fake vegetarian" and have eliminated most meat from my diet. I wish more people would see things as a scale. Less meat is more better.
I just call myself vegetarian-ish. If cutting meat out entirely is the only thing stopping someone from eating better, then there's nothing wrong compromising a bit. Same goes with Reddit. I nuked...
I just call myself vegetarian-ish. If cutting meat out entirely is the only thing stopping someone from eating better, then there's nothing wrong compromising a bit.
Same goes with Reddit. I nuked my account, but still check in to my city's subreddit for local news once in a while, I just don't interact with the comments at all. However someone wants to interact with the site now is their business, but if they've used it as a chance to re-evaluate their relationship with Reddit and what they're getting out of it, that's a good thing.
My brother has been vegan for about a year now, and when we go to our parents for a meal, they moan a lot about making vegan options for him. My dad especially wants him to get back to eating...
My brother has been vegan for about a year now, and when we go to our parents for a meal, they moan a lot about making vegan options for him. My dad especially wants him to get back to eating meat, and tends to not touch the vegan options.
But a lot of them are actually delicious. I make it a point to try the vegan food each time now, and I've never regretted it.
I've been to events where they have just enough servings of vegan food for the vegans and no extra, so sometimes I turn down vegan food so the vegans aren't left without anything to eat. It's kind...
I've offered vegan food to someone and they're like "No thank you, I'm not vegan." It's like what? You don't have to be vegan to eat this.
I've been to events where they have just enough servings of vegan food for the vegans and no extra, so sometimes I turn down vegan food so the vegans aren't left without anything to eat.
It's kind of like using the handicapped stall-- anyone can use it, but you sure do feel like an asshole if you use it when there are other options and then a disabled person comes into the bathroom. Most events don't order enough vegan food to go around! I'm just trying to be polite by making sure the option stays available.
Vegan activist groups have been working on this for ages, you're completely right. The concept of "Meatless _____day" was originally promoted by the US government during WW1, but has since been...
My goal for that is to make it easier for other people to eventually move away from meat altogether, which would reduce the overall consumption of flesh, and the atrocities of the meat industry.
Vegan activist groups have been working on this for ages, you're completely right. The concept of "Meatless _____day" was originally promoted by the US government during WW1, but has since been co-opted by animal rights movements for all the reasons you've explained.
I've been vegan for around a decade, but I've never been a fan of the purist mindset, and I have no hopes for the entire planet to adopt any such pure vegan diet. Reducing meat consumption is a good thing, no matter how small, and although it's hard to get any large group of vegans to agree on anything, many vegans today agree on that.
I could go on because it's interesting to discuss, but I don't want to take us more off topic than we already have gone! The analogy was clear to me from your initial comment.
That's a great metaphor with the meat-eater vs. vegan/vegetarian comparison. I like meat, and I do eat it semi-regularly, but I frequently choose vegetarian options if I know I like or prefer...
That's a great metaphor with the meat-eater vs. vegan/vegetarian comparison. I like meat, and I do eat it semi-regularly, but I frequently choose vegetarian options if I know I like or prefer those. Chili, for example, I strongly prefer vegetarian, with lots of beans. But I also love nuggets from McDonald's or a good shrimp fried rice. Big picture, I know that if I and others simply reduce meat intake, though, there will be societal and environmental benefits (and health benefits for me, but that's just me).
I mean, part of using 'cold turkey' as the term is coopting addiction terms. When you're trying to quit an addiction, cold turkey is not always the best choice, but it works for many. For some,...
I mean, part of using 'cold turkey' as the term is coopting addiction terms.
When you're trying to quit an addiction, cold turkey is not always the best choice, but it works for many. For some, total abstinance from addiction is the best path.
However, going cold turkey from Reddit also generally means also not fretting too much about the state of the site anymore either.
For me, I still read reddit sometimes but I don't post any more. I refuse to contribute content of any kind to the site. Something as simple as an analytical baseball comment or a link to a...
For me, I still read reddit sometimes but I don't post any more. I refuse to contribute content of any kind to the site.
Something as simple as an analytical baseball comment or a link to a helpful formatting document-- I won't do it any more.
It's unfortunately still the most efficient way to curate mass amounts of information in an easily digestible format.
We were raised this way. Compromises are rarely given, so it's not a surprise that we see anything short of a complete drop as "folding". You either get into a school or don't, you either get a...
People have this black and white thinking where it's like you either use it or you don't, no middle ground. If you use it at all, you're not mad enough at Reddit or something. Like everyone needs to go cold turkey so that reddit grinds to a hault.
We were raised this way. Compromises are rarely given, so it's not a surprise that we see anything short of a complete drop as "folding". You either get into a school or don't, you either get a job or don't, you commit a sin and you're a sinner but can be redeemed by offering tithes to God. No surprise we find a binary all or nothing for forming habits.
With all that said, I do find r/place as low hanging fruit and it's a bit of a shame that it will probably work. Be it from the apathetic or the ones remaining that feel they can ruin a billion dollar company with shit posts. At least the former geniunely are unaware (I don't expect everyone to care about every Internet drama).
To your point about engagement: to the bean counters, wouldn’t a bunch of accounts suddenly partaking in “no engagement” be more meaningful that a bunch of accounts partaking in “limited...
To your point about engagement: to the bean counters, wouldn’t a bunch of accounts suddenly partaking in “no engagement” be more meaningful that a bunch of accounts partaking in “limited engagement”?
You said that limited engagement is better but I don’t think you really quantified why.
Well I am a weirdo with food and disagree with eating vegan food as a nonvegan I actually havnt curtailed my reddit use at all, except that my app dosnt work to vier pr0n anymore, but that was...
Well I am a weirdo with food and disagree with eating vegan food as a nonvegan
I actually havnt curtailed my reddit use at all, except that my app dosnt work to vier pr0n anymore, but that was such a small use of my reddit time in the first place
Other than not being able to view pr0n anymore, infinity is still chugging along almost unhindered
If infinity stopped working July 1st, I would have cut my reddit use down by 99%, because I deleted theoffical app on July first out of protest, now I can't view chats as that dosnt work on infinity
Ive looked for coin roll hunting andmetal detecting communities off reddit, but Facebook seems to be the only other place for those, much better right lol
Making it obvious that the site's management is hated by its userbase (i.e. "the product is restless") is not going to be very reassuring to potential investors. If it makes the news (which, we're...
Making it obvious that the site's management is hated by its userbase (i.e. "the product is restless") is not going to be very reassuring to potential investors. If it makes the news (which, we're here because of an article in Vice), the pool of uninformed potential investors gets a lot smaller. I know people like to meme about investors hyperfixating on metrics, but most investors are not morons and do at least a cursory bit of investigation into any property they're about to sink a great deal of money into; Reddit's decade+ of bad press (and the recent density thereof) is absolutely going to negatively impact the price if they ever actually do IPO.
edit: Put a slightly different way: Reddit doesn't have to have a DiggV4 moment before the IPO for its IPO to suffer. If investors think there might be a DiggV4 moment, they're not going to throw very much money into this hole in the internet that also might explode randomly in the future. And massive, extremely visible discontent of the userbase with site administration is absolutely an indicator of a potential exodus.
At this point I'd be surprised if the investors cared. They may just want the same short that some reddit execs are planning. They aren't investing in reddit for its long term growth. Quite the...
Making it obvious that the site's management is hated by its userbase (i.e. "the product is restless") is not going to be very reassuring to potential investors
At this point I'd be surprised if the investors cared. They may just want the same short that some reddit execs are planning. They aren't investing in reddit for its long term growth.
know people like to meme about investors hyperfixating on metrics, but most investors are not morons and do at least a cursory bit of investigation into any property they're about to sink a great deal of money into
Quite the contrary, I think it's very smart. Absolutely diabolical and a sign that we should completely redo how the stock market works, but from the POV of getting a quick and fast payday I completely understand. Low interest rate periods are over and Reddit wants to cash out before it inevitably bleeds profits on money it doesn't get anymore. The Pandemic boons on tech are on the decline and investors simply want one last slice of that pie before it's all gone.
As I'm sure you can imagine, it's an approach that completely spits in the face of any invested former and current users who got Reddit to that point, but it's starting to be faux pas to talk about how a billion dollar company doesn't have the best interests of its users in mind with business directions.
If the company can claim they drove up user engagement, investors won't care. The only thing that could impact the IPO is the user base/advertisers leaving.
If the company can claim they drove up user engagement, investors won't care. The only thing that could impact the IPO is the user base/advertisers leaving.
I think you're partly right, but I also think this isn't what they wanted either. Some investors won't care, but unless it was a huge sustained spike in activity, articles like these aren't a...
I think you're partly right, but I also think this isn't what they wanted either. Some investors won't care, but unless it was a huge sustained spike in activity, articles like these aren't a great look.
I'm sure this isn't Spez wanted, though how obvious this result was makes it baffling that he bothered to begin with. That is to say, I'm sure the IPO doesn't care, but we've seen Spez act against...
I'm sure this isn't Spez wanted, though how obvious this result was makes it baffling that he bothered to begin with.
That is to say, I'm sure the IPO doesn't care, but we've seen Spez act against the interest of said IPO multiple times. He is still human, after all; a horrible quality for a billion dollar CEO.
Which is hilarious on its own, if only because fidelity is consistently lowering the valuation of reddit for their IPO. Personally, I'm thinking of immediately buying shorts if they do go public.
Which is hilarious on its own, if only because fidelity is consistently lowering the valuation of reddit for their IPO.
Personally, I'm thinking of immediately buying shorts if they do go public.
Right now they probably care more about active users numbers for the IPO than they do ad revenue. After the IPO, I fully expect them to make a quick exit and leave others to put out the smoldering...
Right now they probably care more about active users numbers for the IPO than they do ad revenue.
After the IPO, I fully expect them to make a quick exit and leave others to put out the smoldering corpse of the site, so I doubt what happens after matters much to them.
People suck at making sacrifices. Ignoring what I personally think of him, the number of people who now think Musk is one of the worst people in the world, who complain about it on twitter, is...
People suck at making sacrifices. Ignoring what I personally think of him, the number of people who now think Musk is one of the worst people in the world, who complain about it on twitter, is high enough to be darkly hilarious.
I jumped ship from reddit hard. It took a few days for me to adapt, but by pruning my bookmarks/pins it helped a ton, and now I usually only wind up there if linked from someone else or because i'm researching a product.
The average person though is more likely to continue buying the product while complaining about where it's heading. I'm sure i'm guilty of this too in plenty of other cases.
Yep, it's easy to talk shit about stuff you don't like. Behavioral changes are hard. That goes way beyond our usage of products and services, and even affects bigger issues like environmental...
Yep, it's easy to talk shit about stuff you don't like. Behavioral changes are hard. That goes way beyond our usage of products and services, and even affects bigger issues like environmental problems and climate change.
Shows how spineless the Reddit remainers are. Like the moment Reddit started threatening demods/bans everyone came grovelling back to them. That being said I know a lot of people who outright...
Shows how spineless the Reddit remainers are. Like the moment Reddit started threatening demods/bans everyone came grovelling back to them.
That being said I know a lot of people who outright purged their Reddit accounts over this.
A lot--not all--of reddit users (who remained) remind me uncomfortably of anti-maskers during the pandemic. They proudly profess how uncaring they are about anything that they perceive as not...
A lot--not all--of reddit users (who remained) remind me uncomfortably of anti-maskers during the pandemic. They proudly profess how uncaring they are about anything that they perceive as not affecting them directly, and when they do care it's mainly about whether it personally inconveniences them in any way (unacceptable, apparently).
And even more people purged their accounts once Reddit announced they were changing Reddit Gold/Premium without compensation to those who'd already paid for a year.
And even more people purged their accounts once Reddit announced they were changing Reddit Gold/Premium without compensation to those who'd already paid for a year.
Yep, I'm fully unconvinced that Reddit would rather have 1% more users, even as those users are actively trying to tank the value of the company. If userbase was all they cared about, they...
Yep, I'm fully unconvinced that Reddit would rather have 1% more users, even as those users are actively trying to tank the value of the company. If userbase was all they cared about, they wouldn't have driven a bunch of us away in June.
You're assuming the decision makers are level headed and open to listening to the concerns of those smarter and more plugged in than them. At a certain point, given sufficient enabling via money...
They would have no incentive to do this if they felt the PR would be bad.
You're assuming the decision makers are level headed and open to listening to the concerns of those smarter and more plugged in than them.
At a certain point, given sufficient enabling via money and power, it is indeed possible to be completely disconnected from reality and believe wholeheartedly in your own delusions to the point that any contradictory information just does not penetrate at all.
I feel that only proves my point. I should clarify that I meant "They would have no incentive to do this to appeal to shareholders if they felt the PR would be bad.". I wasn't arguing from a moral...
I feel that only proves my point. I should clarify that I meant "They would have no incentive to do this to appeal to shareholders if they felt the PR would be bad.". I wasn't arguing from a moral nor ethical POV. Simply from a short term financial one.
I always find it funny when I click to see the usernames of people who are writing "Fuck Spez" and then go to their profiles only to see they actively post daily and have reddit premium or something.
I always find it funny when I click to see the usernames of people who are writing "Fuck Spez" and then go to their profiles only to see they actively post daily and have reddit premium or something.
Of course the most active users of the website would be involved in this. It’s self evident. If they weren’t active in the first place they wouldn’t care enough. And if they had stopped being...
Of course the most active users of the website would be involved in this. It’s self evident.
If they weren’t active in the first place they wouldn’t care enough. And if they had stopped being active… they wouldn’t still be here to protest.
People protest in their own ways. I also think continuing to use Reddit at this point is super useless, but a good amount of users are hoping to force change to happen.
That didn’t take long. It is odd though, this type of “protest” is fun and all, but they are still engaging on the site and generally fighting a losing battle. It would make a bigger statement if...
That didn’t take long. It is odd though, this type of “protest” is fun and all, but they are still engaging on the site and generally fighting a losing battle. It would make a bigger statement if redditors disengaged entirely. Vote with your feet (or eyeballs in this case).
Yeah. I lurk on one of the discords coordinating a banner on r/place. In the chat, they were saying they were disappointed to not see as many protests as they thought they would. It's sad that...
Yeah. I lurk on one of the discords coordinating a banner on r/place. In the chat, they were saying they were disappointed to not see as many protests as they thought they would. It's sad that people don't care after all.
But I was thinking, it's not that people don't care. Lots of people who do care have just given up on reddit and left. Why put so much effort into something that has been disappointing to you?
But yeah. It was interesting. I lurk in the discord because I was curious to see how coordination happens.
Nope. It's better to leave a reminder as to why, else you get what's called a cover-up, eerily similar to a Westworld-ian feeling of, "Uh... Where is everybody and what happened?" I personally...
Nope. It's better to leave a reminder as to why, else you get what's called a cover-up, eerily similar to a Westworld-ian feeling of, "Uh... Where is everybody and what happened?" I personally support any protest against such a company, even though my personal opinions might not matter because there's value in a collective. It's similar to not saying anything when you see your friend or classmate or coworker get bullied. The feeling sucks not being able to do anything.
This is a problem that doesn't scale to the physical world. A classroom bully is local and is generally a few peers who aren't beyond discipline. There's a myriad of issues that cause this to...
This is a problem that doesn't scale to the physical world. A classroom bully is local and is generally a few peers who aren't beyond discipline. There's a myriad of issues that cause this to still be an issue, but I digress.
Meanwhile, you can't really shame a large website. The people who can hold the site accountable often don't care about the product most of the time, so you can't appeal to quality. In this situation, You can only deprive it of money. Once you reach a certain critical mass the bad PR angle is nigh useless. The only truly bad PR is lawsuits, lower traffic, or otherwise bad valuations. Everything else simply feeds into their bottom line.
Naming and shaming works regardless of scale. You can indeed hold a site accountable. For example, the "Sorrow Solution" (not the real name) website underwent tremendous Terms of Service changes...
Naming and shaming works regardless of scale. You can indeed hold a site accountable. For example, the "Sorrow Solution" (not the real name) website underwent tremendous Terms of Service changes because of that video.
What are we shaming reddit for? Being a greedy company? These aren't the early Violentacrez days, and that's pretty much what you need for that to work. Spez hasn't done anything (borderline)...
What are we shaming reddit for? Being a greedy company?
These aren't the early Violentacrez days, and that's pretty much what you need for that to work. Spez hasn't done anything (borderline) socially illegal AFAIK, and even if he did "fuck u/Spez" doesn't inform the user. It simply sounds like a rebellious tantrum.
If all redditors did that, then sure. The vast, vast majority of redditors aren't going to leave or protest, though, so just leaving will make an imperceptible dip in user count, while actively...
It would make a bigger statement if redditors disengaged entirely.
If all redditors did that, then sure. The vast, vast majority of redditors aren't going to leave or protest, though, so just leaving will make an imperceptible dip in user count, while actively protesting will make the news like this did. This will damage Reddit's value far more than the ten thousand or so people who participated would have if they've just disengaged entirely.
Only when the people stay are that 1% (probably much less) who are large contributors. We can't cause a call to action to lurkers/casual browsers, but if a good amount of mods and power users...
Only when the people stay are that 1% (probably much less) who are large contributors. We can't cause a call to action to lurkers/casual browsers, but if a good amount of mods and power users left, that would cause issues.
Instead they chose to do the equivalent of a whoopie cushion in terms of "destroying the site". Many still don't care. If we can't get them to care then there's not much to do in a large fashion. Simply focus on fostering new communities and have them slowly drift towards where the casual people go.
[This turned into catharsis and is longer than I intended] I find it interesting that so many people hear have the "They're foolish for using the site for protest" attitude. As a culture we seem...
[This turned into catharsis and is longer than I intended]
I find it interesting that so many people hear have the "They're foolish for using the site for protest" attitude.
As a culture we seem to feel that abandonment is the only valid choice in these situations. While that may be the case some, or even most, of the time I really believe there's something to be said for sticking it out and fighting back.
Reddit isn't Facebook/insta/twitter/whatever. Reddit was built by it's users. Reddit owes more of it's success to it's users than most social media, and I believe that the user's attachment reflects the years of effort they've placed into building strong communities.
In "the people vs big tech" running away hasn't worked. Fleeing platforms isn't the same as fighting back. Sure, we have some great small communities like this one, and we desperately need more of them, but on a societal level things have only gotten worse. Even Mastodon, which has long been seen as a long term solution, is now threatened by Meta.
My point is that leaving isn't enough by itself. It's usually the hackers (I don't mean that in the criminal sense, but the original meaning of the word) that flee, leaving behind the bulk of the population.
I'm under no illusions that Redditors will win this fight, but maybe, just maybe, they can create a precedence. We need people to know that they can fight back. They need to be shown how. People need to take their anger and do something with it.
I used to think I was weary of these fights, but what I'm really weary of is the hopelessness that permeates it.
It depends on your end goal. If your goal is to have big websites die out or start to improve to get users back, you are right. It didn't work. However, that's never happened in the history of...
In "the people vs big tech" running away hasn't worked
It depends on your end goal. If your goal is to have big websites die out or start to improve to get users back, you are right. It didn't work. However, that's never happened in the history of software without yet another big corporate company taking over. In other words, out of one forest fire and into a campfire that turns into a forest fire (or simply dies down).
My POV has changed over time to reflect a general life mentality: use your limited time to build up, not put down. In terms of this current social media drama: think about how long you or others have spent asking for changes on Reddit and getting nothing or even reversions on functionality. 3 years? 5 years? 10 years? It's been about 7 for me. That's a really long time. How much of that could have been spent better if I was trying to foster sites like Tildes instead of hoping that this time maybe Reddit listens? If I was motivated enough, I may have even been able to make my own reddit replacement to promptly die into irrelevance with.
Maybe there's a chance all this protest affects Reddit. But even if I had hope I simply feel it's better to look out for myself rather than obsess over the whims of people who haven't listened for years. Reddit living or dying shouldn't affect my bottom line on why I browse and engage with communities.
That definitely makes sense. Maybe leaving/protesting isnt mutually exclusive? At the end of the day I think I have a desire to fight back in a way that feels effective. I've been readi g "A...
That definitely makes sense. Maybe leaving/protesting isnt mutually exclusive?
At the end of the day I think I have a desire to fight back in a way that feels effective.
I've been readi g "A Hacker Manifesto" by Wark, and it calls the hackers of the world to recognize themselves as the social class that they are, and to take advantage of the dependence that the Tech companies (named the Vectoralist class) has upon them.
For the forst time in history, the most valuable property, information, has a naturally infinite surplus. All scarcity of information is totally artificial.
We've got to stoo being complicit in our part in building their empire. I wish devs would fight back, go on strike over unethical practices, and take advantage of the advantage we have.
They don't have to be mutually exclusive, no. And if r/place was filled with alternative community or even reasonable demands I would see a stronger point. But as is the current "fuck u/spez"...
They don't have to be mutually exclusive, no. And if r/place was filled with alternative community or even reasonable demands I would see a stronger point. But as is the current "fuck u/spez" doesn't inspire much confidence.
I don't necessarily think it's hopeless, but the one thing I've learned all these years is that the Internet is awful at coordinating with one another. I don't think it's impossible, but I haven't seen the person with the charisma and care to pull it off yet. And you need that central leader to properly keep things together (ironic given all the talk about decentralization, I know). I don't see that here, so it's basically everyone for themselves in my eyes. And my best action as one feels to be what I highlighted in my previous comment.
Maybe I'll be proven wrong, would love to be proven wrong. So best of luck in your endeavors.
It's a pretty good business move for them, to be honest. My suspicion is that their July engagement numbers were looking somewhat rough after all the controversy they courted in June. And with an...
It's a pretty good business move for them, to be honest. My suspicion is that their July engagement numbers were looking somewhat rough after all the controversy they courted in June. And with an IPO offering looming large, showing negative MoM growth of key user metrics would have been incredibly damaging.
r/place is essentially a way for Reddit to hit the boost button on those metrics, temporarily. In 2022, it caused Reddit's mobile app to hit an all time-high of Daily Average Users. So, this will help them recover their July numbers, and then I assume their hope is that by August, users and mods will get over it and start using the site normally again, along the lines of spez's comment of "like all blowups on Reddit, this one will pass as well." It's not an unlikely assumption, since internet/Reddit culture is always seeking novel things to be outraged about, and maybe I'm pessimistic, but I have a hard time believing that the average Reddit user is going to continue to be upset about an two-month-old API issue in August.
The other clever thing about this whole thing is that people are organizing brigades on Lemmy to put a bunch of "fuck spez" stuff all over r/place. Reddit has found a way to compel it's most ardent detractors to diligently visit and engage with their site every five minutes, to click a pixel. The controversy has made headlines, driving more traffic to the site. And then, the next time that Reddit Inc leadership is presenting to their board, all those details will be irrelevant and get summed up in a slide showing that:
a) We made some decisions which we believe will make us more profitable and efficient
b) While there were some objections from a tiny minority of the community...
c) These decisions had no negative impact on our user metrics, as evidenced by <Insert juiced July numbers here>
But also, should it matter? I'm happy to let Reddit be Reddit, with the understanding that I'm not obligated to use their platform, and that there are plenty of other places online I can go to, most of which have a much stronger feeling of online community.
To people clinging to reddit, I suppose so. I don't mind (and prefer) people moving on, and I don't fault those casual browsers who don't know and don't want to know about the drama. But I do feel...
But also, should it matter?
To people clinging to reddit, I suppose so. I don't mind (and prefer) people moving on, and I don't fault those casual browsers who don't know and don't want to know about the drama. But I do feel a bit of vicarious sadness for those who still think they have a chance to "save Reddit". I was the same way after the first blackout, but alas.
They're not trying to help the site at all They're trying to get one single day of huge spike and use that pretty graph to fool buyers. It's electo-prodding a corpse for the jolt to fool a buyer:...
They're not trying to help the site at all
They're trying to get one single day of huge spike and use that pretty graph to fool buyers.
It's electo-prodding a corpse for the jolt to fool a buyer: they know it's a con.
I know this is often repeated but the SEC aggressively goes after companies that try to “fool” investors. Every IPO filing has significant explanations on the risks of the company and these things...
I know this is often repeated but the SEC aggressively goes after companies that try to “fool” investors.
Every IPO filing has significant explanations on the risks of the company and these things have to get mentioned. And then mentioned again in quarterlies.
If Reddit tries to bury this shit for the sake of the IPO, that is one guaranteed way to lose.
Can you help me understand how that works? How did they explain twitter to investors? The risks of never seeing their money again should be obvious, since they were never profitable and don't have...
Can you help me understand how that works? How did they explain twitter to investors? The risks of never seeing their money again should be obvious, since they were never profitable and don't have a clear monetization plan, but how on earth did twitter raise billions of dollars back in 2013?
What if Reddit was truthful and presented a great looking graph 📈 correctly labeled for just one day? How does SEC aggressively go after using statistics truthfully to influence emotional reaction from a hype investor?
2013 and 2023 are very different environments. Twitter had a lot of monetisation potential at the time of IPO. That they subsequently squandered it is a different beast than Reddit IPOing in the...
2013 and 2023 are very different environments. Twitter had a lot of monetisation potential at the time of IPO. That they subsequently squandered it is a different beast than Reddit IPOing in the middle of a community implosion where they risk losing a massive amount of their userbase, are no longer growing, etc
Basically, Twitter isn’t defrauding investors if their monetisation plans are plausible but merely stupid or wrong. But they WOULD BE if they had massive community issues and were simply shoving bot activity to inflate numbers so they look better than reality.
The SEC doesn’t fuck around with this. I would bet money on a lawsuit in the next few years if they keep this trend and do end up doing an IPO anyway.
But I thought fake accounts was a big issue with twitter? 19.42% apparently. https://whatsnewinpublishing.com/19-42-of-active-twitter-accounts-are-fake-or-spam-analysis/ I guess we'll wait and...
But I thought fake accounts was a big issue with twitter?
The article is from 2023. The SEC doesn't care about private companies (which Twitter now once-again is). If it can be even hinted at that Twitter was posting misleading statements in their...
The article is from 2023. The SEC doesn't care about private companies (which Twitter now once-again is).
If it can be even hinted at that Twitter was posting misleading statements in their filings, pumping up the numbers etc they would have the SEC all over them.
But even now I doubt they would, because it's private again and completely out of cash.
No evidence it's temporary. It's not like /r/place is front page news and people that left reddit are going back just to place a pixel or two. It's users already there, that never left, that...
No evidence it's temporary. It's not like /r/place is front page news and people that left reddit are going back just to place a pixel or two. It's users already there, that never left, that continue to protest on a site they claim to despise.
If your town started making bad decisions, would you begrudge those who protested in some capacity while still paying taxes there instead of moving? Ultimately an online space cannot be held to...
If your town started making bad decisions, would you begrudge those who protested in some capacity while still paying taxes there instead of moving?
Ultimately an online space cannot be held to the same level of permanence or inertia as a real place, but some level of protest is not hypocrisy or unwarranted.
When moving costs a grand total of $0 and can be done instantly with no penalties outside the site and when alternatives with a healthier environment and more honest discussion exists? Yeah I would.
When moving costs a grand total of $0 and can be done instantly with no penalties outside the site and when alternatives with a healthier environment and more honest discussion exists?
As others have pointed out the "cost" is not zero. A lot of hyper-niche or specific communities exist on reddit and nowhere else. Where else on the internet will I find the majesty of...
As others have pointed out the "cost" is not zero. A lot of hyper-niche or specific communities exist on reddit and nowhere else. Where else on the internet will I find the majesty of /r/vogonpoetrycircle or /r/askhistorians? And even among mainstream of big topics, the reddit community was more fun. /r/mathematics is a good example. It sucks to leave them.
Search harder or make them yourselves. Reddit didn't create those communities and you don't even need a fraction of a fraction of a percent of users on a sub like AskHistorians to make a cozy...
A lot of hyper-niche or specific communities exist on reddit and nowhere else
Search harder or make them yourselves. Reddit didn't create those communities and you don't even need a fraction of a fraction of a percent of users on a sub like AskHistorians to make a cozy replacement.
Besides, I still think it's a bit dramatic comparing some joke sub to an already niche (but well beloved) work to moving out of your house.
If conjuring up a niche community was easy, we wouldn’t even be talking about Reddit anymore. Network effects are the force of gravity in the social world. You as an individual cannot force a new...
If conjuring up a niche community was easy, we wouldn’t even be talking about Reddit anymore.
Network effects are the force of gravity in the social world. You as an individual cannot force a new community into existence just because you want it to be.
It's not easy. But it won't be easy supposedly toppling Reddit either. In the same way I can't make a million seller indie video game, no. But I can try. The bright side is that I don't need to do...
It's not easy. But it won't be easy supposedly toppling Reddit either.
You as an individual cannot force a new community into existence just because you want it to be.
In the same way I can't make a million seller indie video game, no. But I can try.
The bright side is that I don't need to do all that technical and infrastructure work. plenty of sites exist as is today. In theory I can do a good part by becoming a power user and providing content that potential community members value. I could even advertise, though I'm certain an admin of such a new site has better logistics for that.
This all sounds like a lot, but think about how long people have complained about reddit. Think about how many posts you could contribute to a new community that aligns with your values in that time. Even if we're simply talking about a post every few weeks we're still talking hundreds of interesting posts.
This is hilariously unhelpful advice. I've personally helped build a bunch of reddit communities (in the sciences mostly, you can check my reddit account linked in my tildes profile if proof is...
Search harder or make them yourselves.
This is hilariously unhelpful advice. I've personally helped build a bunch of reddit communities (in the sciences mostly, you can check my reddit account linked in my tildes profile if proof is required) and it's difficult work.
Reddit didn't create those communities and you don't even need a fraction of a fraction of a percent of users on a sub like AskHistorians to make a cozy replacement.
The main draw of a place like /r/askhistorians is that it's populated by real historians or people who are incredibly well versed in history. It's non-trivial to attract that kind of "talent" and build an active community.
Besides, I still think it's a bit dramatic comparing some joke sub to an already niche (but well beloved) work to moving out of your house.
Like I said in the original comment, there's distinct differences, but there's also an inkling of similarity in the two situations. Online spaces aren't interchangeable or intrinsically worthless -- and for some people (myself included) often more important than many of the real spaces they actually inhabit.
I'm sure it was. But you did it, probably when reddit was much less popular. You prove yourelf it's possible. I never said it was easy. But there is no easy, quick solution here. I simply feel...
and it's difficult work.
I'm sure it was. But you did it, probably when reddit was much less popular. You prove yourelf it's possible.
I never said it was easy. But there is no easy, quick solution here. I simply feel there are more productive uses with time and energy, especially by this point where it's clear Reddit does not care about what you and I care about.
is that it's populated by real historians or people who are incredibly well versed in history. It's non-trivial to attract that kind of "talent" and build an active community.
Sure. But there's what? a few 10 thousand of those on reddit? You barely need to attract even 10 for a start. 10 regular posters mean a ton for a new community.
But I'm not in that part of the industry and I don't know what drives people to post on reddit commenting on expertise for free. I'm guessing it's very different from the tech industry so I won't try to compare past a surface level idea of a forum.
Online spaces aren't interchangeable or intrinsically worthless -- and for some people (myself included) often more important than many of the real spaces they actually inhabit.
I suppose that's where we differ. If the community is right and the tech isn't overly intrusive, it shouldn't matter if I'm talking on reddit, Tildes, 4chan, or even MySpace.
I'm oversimplifying, but you hopefully understand my main point. I come to communities to seek interesting ideas and conversations. I don't particularly place much value on any one semi-anonymous individual if the ideas are interesting. That's part of why I use sites like these and not Twitter/Facebook to begin with; much less conerns of appealing to popularity or authority when there's no face behind the name.
there's also an inkling of similarity in the two situations.
an inkling sure. But my concerns are unchanged. If it was 1/1000th of a percent as easy to move as it was to delete my reddit account, I would have done it in a heart beat. Situations where I was scared for my life. So I do find it very facetious to compare not being able to talk with a few like-minded people with being around people who barely saw you as a person, or worse.
I'm not going to address this because I think it's a rabbit hole I'd rather not get into. You're making well thought out arguments, and like you point out, I think we are primarily differing on...
Sure. But there's what? a few 10 thousand of those on reddit? You barely need to attract even 10 for a start. 10 regular posters mean a ton for a new community.
I'm not going to address this because I think it's a rabbit hole I'd rather not get into.
You're making well thought out arguments, and like you point out, I think we are primarily differing on priorities and values in an online community. One aspect I did not bring up of why I value the platform itself is the record of the past and the shared continuity among users who end up recognizing each other. I have over a decade of reddit comments which archive and journal a decent chunk of myself online which is organized in one place and sharable with others on the platform. This also applies to when I begin knowing the prominent members of a community and are able to read not only their concurrent posts but can dive into years' worth of thoughts and conversations they've had. In my view, the semi-autonomous nature of forums and reddit-like platforms enhances this rather than obstructs -- as I'm learning about the "real" versions of people uniquely available because of this semi-autonomous nature. To this end, I'm very excited to be a part of tildes as it grows, and I would be sad if for some reason all of this went away in a year or something. I am uniquely delighted in the few users who I knew on reddit and decided to keep their reddit usernames here as I'm not "starting from scratch" on this front.
But my concerns are unchanged. If it was 1/1000th of a percent as easy to move as it was to delete my reddit account, I would have done it in a heart beat. Situations where I was scared for my life. So I do find it very facetious to compare not being able to talk with a few like-minded people with being around people who barely saw you as a person, or worse.
If you build a sense of self and comfort in a community, especially if that community affords you the opportunity to express yourself in ways you cannot do so in real life, whatever the reason, it is difficult and unpleasant when forced to uproot. This is all the idea I'm trying to convey above. There's an inertia involved. The value of the online space comes about precisely because moving your real-life situation is often difficult or impossible (especially for younger folks). I probably shouldn't have used "small town moving/protests" as a metaphor because that metaphor is easily mixed with the actual reasons online spaces have value.
Perhaps. My life experience is full of uprooting and starting over, IRL and on the internet. I've never been in the same city for more than 4 years until college, and I've always rotated forums...
think we are primarily differing on priorities and values in an online community.
Perhaps. My life experience is full of uprooting and starting over, IRL and on the internet. I've never been in the same city for more than 4 years until college, and I've always rotated forums because I lurked for a very long time. So I could be less sympathetic to those who don't want to go through that given that that's been my entire life.
It can suck but it's also not the end of the world. The friends and community that really want to keep you in their life will make the steps. The truly painful part is knowing that most won't, but maybe that's a good lesson to learn. Helps you learn to find value in yourself from within instead of seeking others' validation for acceptance. I may even argue that it helps to enjoy hobbies more since you know you like it, instead of it being something you may kinda like but do to stick with friends.
If you build a sense of self and comfort in a community, especially if that community affords you the opportunity to express yourself in ways you cannot do so in real life, whatever the reason, it is difficult and unpleasant when forced to uproot.
I'll take my leave with one of my favorite video game quotes. Still one I strive to meet, so I don't expect anything in this conversation to result in a radical change if I still can't stick by my words:
"It never stops burning. My skin. Every day, I have to unwind the bandages and replace them with fresh ones. Exposing my body to the air is like living through it again. But it's better to be clean than comfortable."
To keep the town analogy rolling, I wouldn't blame them if the alternative with a healthier environment and more honest discussion is the equivalent of a backwoods town in northeast Montana. No...
To keep the town analogy rolling, I wouldn't blame them if the alternative with a healthier environment and more honest discussion is the equivalent of a backwoods town in northeast Montana. No offense to this site, I love it here, but it is not comparable to reddit, and I can't blame someone for staying in the equivalent of a New England megalopolis. It might generally suck there, but it's where all their friends and family live, and it's the only place they can find that one really obscure comic book store that specializes in a series that's been out of print for two decades.
You might be fine with giving up those small forums where you can discuss the hyper specific media you're into without taking on the responsibility of building that forum yourself. I'm barely okay with it, because I let my principles affect my decisions far more than I really should. I certainly don't blame anyone who stuck around because it's the only place they feel they can connect with other people.
I don't either, but if experience serves, I feel sorry for how much energy they will take to hang onto a crumbling cliff instead of starting that painful process. The sooner the better.
I certainly don't blame anyone who stuck around because it's the only place they feel they can connect with other people.
I don't either, but if experience serves, I feel sorry for how much energy they will take to hang onto a crumbling cliff instead of starting that painful process. The sooner the better.
When the effort and cost necessary to "move" is zero, no level of hypocrisy is acceptable protest. Hell, the cost and effort to "move" from reddit is a net positive, as time not spent on a site...
When the effort and cost necessary to "move" is zero, no level of hypocrisy is acceptable protest.
Hell, the cost and effort to "move" from reddit is a net positive, as time not spent on a site you claim to despise is time you get back.
If your town started making bad decisions, would you not leave if they paid you to do so?
The cost is absolutely not a net positive for a lot of us. Leaving reddit meant leaving the only place where I can talk to anyone about any of the media or hobbies I enjoy. I don't know anyone...
The cost is absolutely not a net positive for a lot of us. Leaving reddit meant leaving the only place where I can talk to anyone about any of the media or hobbies I enjoy. I don't know anyone who's into astronomy or manga. The only person I know who's into anime only watches shounen. Leaving reddit was a net negative for me.
It's a bummer reading these comments, I'm seeing a lot of disdain aimed at the people who use reddit, when it's the site admins that deserve it.
Places to discuss that existed prior to reddit, they can and will exist after reddit. Just have to find them. I have no disdain for people using reddit, I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of...
Places to discuss that existed prior to reddit, they can and will exist after reddit. Just have to find them.
I have no disdain for people using reddit, I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of protesting reddit on reddit where doing so has a direct financial contribution to the entity being protested.
It's like protesting Chick-fil-a's anti-LGBT actions while ordering a sandwich or Starbucks anti-union practices with a pumpkin spice latte in your hand.
Leaving Reddit has meant losing my main source of ADHD support outside of my doctors. It was still a net gain, but I definitely feel less connected to people who have the same struggles I do.
Leaving Reddit has meant losing my main source of ADHD support outside of my doctors. It was still a net gain, but I definitely feel less connected to people who have the same struggles I do.
Sure, as long as you ignore the other times r/place has been done. It always generates a bunch of new traffic but the vast majority of people who take part in it don't stick around afterwards....
No evidence it's temporary.
Sure, as long as you ignore the other times r/place has been done. It always generates a bunch of new traffic but the vast majority of people who take part in it don't stick around afterwards. It's ephemeral. It's not going to magically make reddit's IPO more attractive.
You're thinking long term in a stock market full of shorts and fluctuations by the quarter. It will make their IPO more attractive and I wouldn't be surprised if the big shareholders don't care if...
It's not going to magically make reddit's IPO more attractive.
You're thinking long term in a stock market full of shorts and fluctuations by the quarter. It will make their IPO more attractive and I wouldn't be surprised if the big shareholders don't care if reddit survives 2024 (probably will, but not well).
To be honest, that's exactly what I am doing. I have popped on a couple times, place a pixel (to fix one of the protest sections) then close the tab. Do it again when I see an article, then forget...
and people that left reddit are going back just to place a pixel or two
To be honest, that's exactly what I am doing. I have popped on a couple times, place a pixel (to fix one of the protest sections) then close the tab. Do it again when I see an article, then forget about it.
Why not, though? Engagement, unique IPs, unique IDs are all data that will be used for various justifications for their IPO. This will be a huge boon for those numbers--even if they're mostly...
Why not, though? Engagement, unique IPs, unique IDs are all data that will be used for various justifications for their IPO. This will be a huge boon for those numbers--even if they're mostly bots.
Given the timing of this being trotted out I fully believe they (Reddit) knew the shitshow that was coming and weighed it against the increased metrics it would provide. We know their answer.
My first thought was also that this seemed to be a (successful, surely?) attempt from Reddit to demonstrate that there is still massive engagement, and that participating in r/place is simply...
My first thought was also that this seemed to be a (successful, surely?) attempt from Reddit to demonstrate that there is still massive engagement, and that participating in r/place is simply playing into that. But the discussion here has been interesting.
I do still use Reddit sometimes. There are just some communities that aren't really replaceable for any number of reasons, and I don't really feel any guilt in going back. I've mostly stopped using Reddit for the original reasons: I don't have a good mobile app to access it. But my overall participation has definitely decreased; it was a good time to re-examine how I was using my time and what the quality of information and discussion I was being exposed to was. I don't necessarily think it's useful to treat individual Reddit participation as a moral question. Everyone just kind of has to decide for themselves whether or not they are OK using a worse app, seeing ads, worse moderation, etc.
The reason why all this drama around Reddit is so massive is because it's become sort of the sole location for information and discussion. A lot of people still search for things using search engines; they just add "reddit" because reddit is the place where information is. But that doesn't have to be true. I think building and maintaining alternatives for resources with information (that is easily searchable, like Reddit) works to build a much healthier internet. It's the fact that Reddit has become an informal archive that makes it so important.
I recognize that one of the original impetuses for this whole debacle, scraping via LLMs, isn't addressed. I feel like that kind of thing gets really complicated and I'm not yet equipped to think about it.
All this to say: I think using r/place as a protest isn't necessarily bad. It reminds the users that there are still people that care about the topic, as the protest site-wide has been well-squashed by the admin and the passage of time in general.
Disrupting service, damaging Reddit’s ability to make money, that’s a protest. Using /r/place and writing messages on it is…just normal participation. Writing “Fuck Spez” on it was not the based...
Disrupting service, damaging Reddit’s ability to make money, that’s a protest. Using /r/place and writing messages on it is…just normal participation. Writing “Fuck Spez” on it was not the based revolutionary action that some Redditors seem to think it was.
Shame because Reddit’s messaging has only gotten worse, in their announcement for the event they said they hoped people would direct their “passion” into submitting pixels for /r/place. Engagement of any type was their goal and…they got it.
They’re very aware people aren’t happy and they don’t care, their vision of a massive investment from an IPO is their end game now, everything else is an annoyance at worst.
My only hope is that after the IPO and Reddit’s transformation is complete that they actually bleed users and implode…but Spez and the other executives won’t care even then because they’ll have gotten their payouts and gained their status of being tech giants.
Is it just me? I still have access through RIF, a third party app, but only log out. Jokes on them, I never participated as a long-time lurker, so I don't mind. But that means I still don't have...
Is it just me? I still have access through RIF, a third party app, but only log out. Jokes on them, I never participated as a long-time lurker, so I don't mind.
But that means I still don't have to put up with the terrible GUI, I don't have ads, and I don't promote Reddit's numbers with my participation. I guess I hit the jackpot.
I believe that's how RIF is working for everyone, ever since reddit cut off the API access. I've been browsing occasionally logged out as well, which is not a great experience, so I'm not there...
I believe that's how RIF is working for everyone, ever since reddit cut off the API access. I've been browsing occasionally logged out as well, which is not a great experience, so I'm not there much. But one nice thing is that I can still save subreddits on the sidebar to get around quickly, so it has more usefulness than I thought it would initially.
Interesting method of protesting by... continuing to use the service and make them money.
I've semi-disengaged from reddit and expect only to use the site less in the future but I dislike this argument. Reddit has been my social and internet home for over ten years at this point. I feel connected to it as much as if it was a brick and mortar place in real life. A decent portion of who I am as a human being was shaped there. You could collect my comments there and essentially build a memoir out of them.
Just dropping that cold turkey is hard. It's like leaving a part of yourself behind. I begrudge no one who stays yet still makes their displeasure known.
Thank you for saying this.
I haven't dropped reddit "cold turkey" (even though I'm very happy to be spending my time on Tildes instead,) and I don't necessarily think it's because I'm "addicted" to reddit (the common insult being thrown around there nowadays.) Certainly, old habits die hard, and I'm not claiming that some people don't struggle with an addictive relationship to reddit. I just don't think it's reasonable to prescribe that issue to everyone who "left" reddit and still stops by every now and then. When I visit reddit nowadays, I'm not making some kind of an ethical statement or failed attempt at a protest - I'm just slowly saying goodbye to something I loved for a very long time.
I joined reddit when I was a teenager. A child. When I joined reddit I was a sad, lost teenager with $47 to my name, and now I'm 31 years old with a mortgage and a retirement plan. Reddit has been there, practically every day, that whole time. And for most steps of my adult life, reddit has been a resource. When I was 20, I looked to reddit to understand the basics of a 401k. When I was 25, I searched reddit: "purchasing a first home." After that, I browsed home improvement subreddits. I used reddit, at least partially, to figure out how to retire. So, in a small, indirect way, it will literally be with me until I die. That's how integral reddit was/is for many people's lives.
Other social media sites have come and gone, and I've joined them at times (like to receive/send TikToks to real life friends who prefer that platform,) but reddit has always been my default. It's just always been there, and it's strange to imagine my life without it, even though it's a silly website where I spent a small portion of my days.
I'm at a place that is far, far beyond "protesting" reddit. In fact, even mid-June when all this started, I wasn't "protesting" when I expressed my displeasure with the direction of reddit, I was just beginning my process of letting go of it. I don't want it to go, I genuinely loved reddit. But it's happening regardless.
But I have no goals of "saving" reddit or reversing the changes that have been made. Anyone with their head on straight could tell almost immediately that the company was not interested in keeping us around, and that none of the requests regarding APIs or accessibility would be resolved. For me, it's over. Things have changed. It was bound to happen. But I feel no qualms about checking in on the communities I grew to love and respect over the years, at least the ones that I haven't found any alternative space for.
I don't care how reddit does or does not benefit from any of my actions. That's no longer of concern to me.
It's very interesting because I felt the same when I found reddit but simply have a completely different perspective of the internet. I still feel 99% of what I do here on the internet is ephemeral and I'm fine with that. I don't really trace back and reminiscence on my old GameFaqs comments from 2007 (if I could find them to begin with). And I carried that as I drifted from site to site. Sites slow down or outright die, or I change and desire something different.
No discredit to your experience. I just simply wanted to state an alternate anecdote on why it's easy (relatively) for me to quit a website compared to others. It's all a tool rather than a true sense of community, and I remember older sites at best like I'd remember some old action figures.
Same exerience here. I Just quit Reddit and never looked back. It is over for me the same way IRC, ICQ and MSN are over
I'm certainly not blaming people who find a sense of community at Reddit and want to continue to use it. Obviously not everyone is willing or able to cut the cord. It's addictive, and the only way that I was able to stop using it was because 99% of my usage was mobile and they removed that experience from me (and I'm not willing to put up with their absolute shit app). Other people have different criteria or thresholds on behavior change, and that's all good.
I'm just commenting on the term 'protest'. Closing subreddits was a protest. Making them NSFW so that Reddit couldn't monetize them was a protest. Not visiting the site is a protest. But using their website to post about your displeasure is not a protest, it's just complaining. It would be like protesting Starbucks by going to one, buying a coffee, grabbing a table and talking about how much you hate Starbucks.
Honestly the main reason i quit cold turkey was the spez AMA. Before that i planned to keep using it on PC.
But i might have to come back to it in a couple of weeks when the new Path od Exile patch drops because it's kinda irreplaceable for finding out about hidden mechanics, undocumented changes and general tips about the new content
Exactly the same for me. That whole shit show, and Spez's continued attempts to slander Apollo's developer completely soured my opinion on Reddit to the point that I no longer wanted to be a part of it. I logged out over a month ago and haven't been back.
I'm so happy to be in a discord (really completely unrelated to the game) where there's a PoE guild and I can get my info from there... I've unsubscribed from the poe subreddit several times so far, and everytime it happens faster in a league, because it's such a toxic hole.
Every sub around a game is toxic on reddit, even the minecraft one.
The EFT sub was the worst one I've ever been a part of, and for only a short period.
EFT doesn't ring a bell, what game is that?
I've actually found smaller game communities to be fairly good - Voxel Tycoon, Shapez, etc. Since I've scaled back my reddit use to a single sub I haven't really been seeing if there have been changes there... guessing not
Escape From Tarkov.
If you know anything about the game, I probably don't need to explain why a community based around it would be extra toxic.
If you don't, good for you honestly, stay away from it.
Ahh, battle Royale shooter stuff. I don't play battle Royale games, but I can see how it would be easy to get tons of friction
It's actually impressive how horrible the app is. I tried it out because, as others have said, it's really hard to quit after 10+ years there, but it's actually unusablely bad. They should be embarrassed.
Yeah, really. As a software engineer, I certainly wouldn't want to put that atrocity on my resume.
I think anything that makes the site worse to use could be a form of protest. That's essentially what the John Oliver protests in /r/pics were doing. Acknowledging that there wasn't any real avenues of protest, so they were going to just make the overall user experience worse and hurt engagement.
I'm over 30 and have basically been a habitual Reddit user for half my life. Though I have found that it has become a much more unhealthy habit over the past five or so years, driven more by addiction than anything. The fun internet subculture is gone, the quality of discussion has dropped to pathetic levels, and there just isn't much left.
I haven't really used it since they threw the switch on the API changes, though I'm very annoyed that communities for hobbies and things persist there when they belong on independent forums instead of the garbage dump Reddit had become. We'd be better off if Reddit just disappeared and the damage they did to niche forums could heal.
Oof. I've literally done this without a second thought. I'll remember this next time a vegan dish is offered to me.
On that note - I'm a "fake vegetarian" and have eliminated most meat from my diet. I wish more people would see things as a scale. Less meat is more better.
I just call myself vegetarian-ish. If cutting meat out entirely is the only thing stopping someone from eating better, then there's nothing wrong compromising a bit.
Same goes with Reddit. I nuked my account, but still check in to my city's subreddit for local news once in a while, I just don't interact with the comments at all. However someone wants to interact with the site now is their business, but if they've used it as a chance to re-evaluate their relationship with Reddit and what they're getting out of it, that's a good thing.
(Edited to add a missing word)
I’m certain you eat vegan food all the time but just don’t think of it like that since it isn’t marketed as vegan.
My brother has been vegan for about a year now, and when we go to our parents for a meal, they moan a lot about making vegan options for him. My dad especially wants him to get back to eating meat, and tends to not touch the vegan options.
But a lot of them are actually delicious. I make it a point to try the vegan food each time now, and I've never regretted it.
I've been to events where they have just enough servings of vegan food for the vegans and no extra, so sometimes I turn down vegan food so the vegans aren't left without anything to eat.
It's kind of like using the handicapped stall-- anyone can use it, but you sure do feel like an asshole if you use it when there are other options and then a disabled person comes into the bathroom. Most events don't order enough vegan food to go around! I'm just trying to be polite by making sure the option stays available.
Vegan activist groups have been working on this for ages, you're completely right. The concept of "Meatless _____day" was originally promoted by the US government during WW1, but has since been co-opted by animal rights movements for all the reasons you've explained.
I've been vegan for around a decade, but I've never been a fan of the purist mindset, and I have no hopes for the entire planet to adopt any such pure vegan diet. Reducing meat consumption is a good thing, no matter how small, and although it's hard to get any large group of vegans to agree on anything, many vegans today agree on that.
I could go on because it's interesting to discuss, but I don't want to take us more off topic than we already have gone! The analogy was clear to me from your initial comment.
That's a great metaphor with the meat-eater vs. vegan/vegetarian comparison. I like meat, and I do eat it semi-regularly, but I frequently choose vegetarian options if I know I like or prefer those. Chili, for example, I strongly prefer vegetarian, with lots of beans. But I also love nuggets from McDonald's or a good shrimp fried rice. Big picture, I know that if I and others simply reduce meat intake, though, there will be societal and environmental benefits (and health benefits for me, but that's just me).
I mean, part of using 'cold turkey' as the term is coopting addiction terms.
When you're trying to quit an addiction, cold turkey is not always the best choice, but it works for many. For some, total abstinance from addiction is the best path.
However, going cold turkey from Reddit also generally means also not fretting too much about the state of the site anymore either.
For me, I still read reddit sometimes but I don't post any more. I refuse to contribute content of any kind to the site.
Something as simple as an analytical baseball comment or a link to a helpful formatting document-- I won't do it any more.
It's unfortunately still the most efficient way to curate mass amounts of information in an easily digestible format.
We were raised this way. Compromises are rarely given, so it's not a surprise that we see anything short of a complete drop as "folding". You either get into a school or don't, you either get a job or don't, you commit a sin and you're a sinner
but can be redeemed by offering tithes to God. No surprise we find a binary all or nothing for forming habits.With all that said, I do find r/place as low hanging fruit and it's a bit of a shame that it will probably work. Be it from the apathetic or the ones remaining that feel they can ruin a billion dollar company with shit posts. At least the former geniunely are unaware (I don't expect everyone to care about every Internet drama).
To your point about engagement: to the bean counters, wouldn’t a bunch of accounts suddenly partaking in “no engagement” be more meaningful that a bunch of accounts partaking in “limited engagement”?
You said that limited engagement is better but I don’t think you really quantified why.
Well I am a weirdo with food and disagree with eating vegan food as a nonvegan
I actually havnt curtailed my reddit use at all, except that my app dosnt work to vier pr0n anymore, but that was such a small use of my reddit time in the first place
Other than not being able to view pr0n anymore, infinity is still chugging along almost unhindered
If infinity stopped working July 1st, I would have cut my reddit use down by 99%, because I deleted theoffical app on July first out of protest, now I can't view chats as that dosnt work on infinity
Ive looked for coin roll hunting andmetal detecting communities off reddit, but Facebook seems to be the only other place for those, much better right lol
Making it obvious that the site's management is hated by its userbase (i.e. "the product is restless") is not going to be very reassuring to potential investors. If it makes the news (which, we're here because of an article in Vice), the pool of uninformed potential investors gets a lot smaller. I know people like to meme about investors hyperfixating on metrics, but most investors are not morons and do at least a cursory bit of investigation into any property they're about to sink a great deal of money into; Reddit's decade+ of bad press (and the recent density thereof) is absolutely going to negatively impact the price if they ever actually do IPO.
edit: Put a slightly different way: Reddit doesn't have to have a DiggV4 moment before the IPO for its IPO to suffer. If investors think there might be a DiggV4 moment, they're not going to throw very much money into this hole in the internet that also might explode randomly in the future. And massive, extremely visible discontent of the userbase with site administration is absolutely an indicator of a potential exodus.
At this point I'd be surprised if the investors cared. They may just want the same short that some reddit execs are planning. They aren't investing in reddit for its long term growth.
Quite the contrary, I think it's very smart. Absolutely diabolical and a sign that we should completely redo how the stock market works, but from the POV of getting a quick and fast payday I completely understand. Low interest rate periods are over and Reddit wants to cash out before it inevitably bleeds profits on money it doesn't get anymore. The Pandemic boons on tech are on the decline and investors simply want one last slice of that pie before it's all gone.
As I'm sure you can imagine, it's an approach that completely spits in the face of any invested former and current users who got Reddit to that point, but it's starting to be faux pas to talk about how a billion dollar company doesn't have the best interests of its users in mind with business directions.
If you have an adblocker and don't browse except for cases like clicking links, does that really generate income for them?
It still registers as activity, which is vital for their upcoming IPO.
I would argue that a large majority of users writing "fuck the CEO" is not a great look for investors. Especially when it's making articles like this.
If the company can claim they drove up user engagement, investors won't care. The only thing that could impact the IPO is the user base/advertisers leaving.
I think you're partly right, but I also think this isn't what they wanted either. Some investors won't care, but unless it was a huge sustained spike in activity, articles like these aren't a great look.
I'm sure this isn't Spez wanted, though how obvious this result was makes it baffling that he bothered to begin with.
That is to say, I'm sure the IPO doesn't care, but we've seen Spez act against the interest of said IPO multiple times. He is still human, after all; a horrible quality for a billion dollar CEO.
Which is hilarious on its own, if only because fidelity is consistently lowering the valuation of reddit for their IPO.
Personally, I'm thinking of immediately buying shorts if they do go public.
Right now they probably care more about active users numbers for the IPO than they do ad revenue.
After the IPO, I fully expect them to make a quick exit and leave others to put out the smoldering corpse of the site, so I doubt what happens after matters much to them.
People suck at making sacrifices. Ignoring what I personally think of him, the number of people who now think Musk is one of the worst people in the world, who complain about it on twitter, is high enough to be darkly hilarious.
I jumped ship from reddit hard. It took a few days for me to adapt, but by pruning my bookmarks/pins it helped a ton, and now I usually only wind up there if linked from someone else or because i'm researching a product.
The average person though is more likely to continue buying the product while complaining about where it's heading. I'm sure i'm guilty of this too in plenty of other cases.
Yep, it's easy to talk shit about stuff you don't like. Behavioral changes are hard. That goes way beyond our usage of products and services, and even affects bigger issues like environmental problems and climate change.
Shows how spineless the Reddit remainers are. Like the moment Reddit started threatening demods/bans everyone came grovelling back to them.
That being said I know a lot of people who outright purged their Reddit accounts over this.
What's the basis for this argument? Do you have any numbers on how many people said they would leave? How many actually left? How many went back?
I did this. Deleted everything I ever contributed and just left the account with a single "fuck /u/spez" comment and the logged out for the last time.
A lot--not all--of reddit users (who remained) remind me uncomfortably of anti-maskers during the pandemic. They proudly profess how uncaring they are about anything that they perceive as not affecting them directly, and when they do care it's mainly about whether it personally inconveniences them in any way (unacceptable, apparently).
I guess humans are just like that?
And even more people purged their accounts once Reddit announced they were changing Reddit Gold/Premium without compensation to those who'd already paid for a year.
Yup, my 144k karma account is gone. Only after did I realise how much time I wasted and how stressed I was.
As long as you're using adblock, the negative PR from these articles probably hurts them more than the marginally increased activity levels help them.
Yep, I'm fully unconvinced that Reddit would rather have 1% more users, even as those users are actively trying to tank the value of the company. If userbase was all they cared about, they wouldn't have driven a bunch of us away in June.
At this point I wonder if that is true. They would have no incentive to do this if they felt the PR would be bad.
You're assuming the decision makers are level headed and open to listening to the concerns of those smarter and more plugged in than them.
At a certain point, given sufficient enabling via money and power, it is indeed possible to be completely disconnected from reality and believe wholeheartedly in your own delusions to the point that any contradictory information just does not penetrate at all.
I feel that only proves my point. I should clarify that I meant "They would have no incentive to do this to appeal to shareholders if they felt the PR would be bad.". I wasn't arguing from a moral nor ethical POV. Simply from a short term financial one.
I always find it funny when I click to see the usernames of people who are writing "Fuck Spez" and then go to their profiles only to see they actively post daily and have reddit premium or something.
Of course the most active users of the website would be involved in this. It’s self evident.
If they weren’t active in the first place they wouldn’t care enough. And if they had stopped being active… they wouldn’t still be here to protest.
People protest in their own ways. I also think continuing to use Reddit at this point is super useless, but a good amount of users are hoping to force change to happen.
This is that meme with the dude in the pipe.
That didn’t take long. It is odd though, this type of “protest” is fun and all, but they are still engaging on the site and generally fighting a losing battle. It would make a bigger statement if redditors disengaged entirely. Vote with your feet (or eyeballs in this case).
Yeah. I lurk on one of the discords coordinating a banner on r/place. In the chat, they were saying they were disappointed to not see as many protests as they thought they would. It's sad that people don't care after all.
But I was thinking, it's not that people don't care. Lots of people who do care have just given up on reddit and left. Why put so much effort into something that has been disappointing to you?
But yeah. It was interesting. I lurk in the discord because I was curious to see how coordination happens.
Nope. It's better to leave a reminder as to why, else you get what's called a cover-up, eerily similar to a Westworld-ian feeling of, "Uh... Where is everybody and what happened?" I personally support any protest against such a company, even though my personal opinions might not matter because there's value in a collective. It's similar to not saying anything when you see your friend or classmate or coworker get bullied. The feeling sucks not being able to do anything.
This is a problem that doesn't scale to the physical world. A classroom bully is local and is generally a few peers who aren't beyond discipline. There's a myriad of issues that cause this to still be an issue, but I digress.
Meanwhile, you can't really shame a large website. The people who can hold the site accountable often don't care about the product most of the time, so you can't appeal to quality. In this situation, You can only deprive it of money. Once you reach a certain critical mass the bad PR angle is nigh useless. The only truly bad PR is lawsuits, lower traffic, or otherwise bad valuations. Everything else simply feeds into their bottom line.
Naming and shaming works regardless of scale. You can indeed hold a site accountable. For example, the "Sorrow Solution" (not the real name) website underwent tremendous Terms of Service changes because of that video.
What are we shaming reddit for? Being a greedy company?
These aren't the early Violentacrez days, and that's pretty much what you need for that to work. Spez hasn't done anything (borderline) socially illegal AFAIK, and even if he did "fuck u/Spez" doesn't inform the user. It simply sounds like a rebellious tantrum.
If all redditors did that, then sure. The vast, vast majority of redditors aren't going to leave or protest, though, so just leaving will make an imperceptible dip in user count, while actively protesting will make the news like this did. This will damage Reddit's value far more than the ten thousand or so people who participated would have if they've just disengaged entirely.
Only when the people stay are that 1% (probably much less) who are large contributors. We can't cause a call to action to lurkers/casual browsers, but if a good amount of mods and power users left, that would cause issues.
Instead they chose to do the equivalent of a whoopie cushion in terms of "destroying the site". Many still don't care. If we can't get them to care then there's not much to do in a large fashion. Simply focus on fostering new communities and have them slowly drift towards where the casual people go.
[This turned into catharsis and is longer than I intended]
I find it interesting that so many people hear have the "They're foolish for using the site for protest" attitude.
As a culture we seem to feel that abandonment is the only valid choice in these situations. While that may be the case some, or even most, of the time I really believe there's something to be said for sticking it out and fighting back.
Reddit isn't Facebook/insta/twitter/whatever. Reddit was built by it's users. Reddit owes more of it's success to it's users than most social media, and I believe that the user's attachment reflects the years of effort they've placed into building strong communities.
In "the people vs big tech" running away hasn't worked. Fleeing platforms isn't the same as fighting back. Sure, we have some great small communities like this one, and we desperately need more of them, but on a societal level things have only gotten worse. Even Mastodon, which has long been seen as a long term solution, is now threatened by Meta.
My point is that leaving isn't enough by itself. It's usually the hackers (I don't mean that in the criminal sense, but the original meaning of the word) that flee, leaving behind the bulk of the population.
I'm under no illusions that Redditors will win this fight, but maybe, just maybe, they can create a precedence. We need people to know that they can fight back. They need to be shown how. People need to take their anger and do something with it.
I used to think I was weary of these fights, but what I'm really weary of is the hopelessness that permeates it.
It depends on your end goal. If your goal is to have big websites die out or start to improve to get users back, you are right. It didn't work. However, that's never happened in the history of software without yet another big corporate company taking over. In other words, out of one forest fire and into a campfire that turns into a forest fire (or simply dies down).
My POV has changed over time to reflect a general life mentality: use your limited time to build up, not put down. In terms of this current social media drama: think about how long you or others have spent asking for changes on Reddit and getting nothing or even reversions on functionality. 3 years? 5 years? 10 years? It's been about 7 for me. That's a really long time. How much of that could have been spent better if I was trying to foster sites like Tildes instead of hoping that this time maybe Reddit listens? If I was motivated enough, I may have even been able to make my own reddit replacement
to promptly die into irrelevance with.Maybe there's a chance all this protest affects Reddit. But even if I had hope I simply feel it's better to look out for myself rather than obsess over the whims of people who haven't listened for years. Reddit living or dying shouldn't affect my bottom line on why I browse and engage with communities.
That definitely makes sense. Maybe leaving/protesting isnt mutually exclusive?
At the end of the day I think I have a desire to fight back in a way that feels effective.
I've been readi g "A Hacker Manifesto" by Wark, and it calls the hackers of the world to recognize themselves as the social class that they are, and to take advantage of the dependence that the Tech companies (named the Vectoralist class) has upon them.
For the forst time in history, the most valuable property, information, has a naturally infinite surplus. All scarcity of information is totally artificial.
We've got to stoo being complicit in our part in building their empire. I wish devs would fight back, go on strike over unethical practices, and take advantage of the advantage we have.
They don't have to be mutually exclusive, no. And if r/place was filled with alternative community or even reasonable demands I would see a stronger point. But as is the current "fuck u/spez" doesn't inspire much confidence.
I don't necessarily think it's hopeless, but the one thing I've learned all these years is that the Internet is awful at coordinating with one another. I don't think it's impossible, but I haven't seen the person with the charisma and care to pull it off yet. And you need that central leader to properly keep things together (ironic given all the talk about decentralization, I know). I don't see that here, so it's basically everyone for themselves in my eyes. And my best action as one feels to be what I highlighted in my previous comment.
Maybe I'll be proven wrong, would love to be proven wrong. So best of luck in your endeavors.
It's a pretty good business move for them, to be honest. My suspicion is that their July engagement numbers were looking somewhat rough after all the controversy they courted in June. And with an IPO offering looming large, showing negative MoM growth of key user metrics would have been incredibly damaging.
r/place is essentially a way for Reddit to hit the boost button on those metrics, temporarily. In 2022, it caused Reddit's mobile app to hit an all time-high of Daily Average Users. So, this will help them recover their July numbers, and then I assume their hope is that by August, users and mods will get over it and start using the site normally again, along the lines of spez's comment of "like all blowups on Reddit, this one will pass as well." It's not an unlikely assumption, since internet/Reddit culture is always seeking novel things to be outraged about, and maybe I'm pessimistic, but I have a hard time believing that the average Reddit user is going to continue to be upset about an two-month-old API issue in August.
The other clever thing about this whole thing is that people are organizing brigades on Lemmy to put a bunch of "fuck spez" stuff all over r/place. Reddit has found a way to compel it's most ardent detractors to diligently visit and engage with their site every five minutes, to click a pixel. The controversy has made headlines, driving more traffic to the site. And then, the next time that Reddit Inc leadership is presenting to their board, all those details will be irrelevant and get summed up in a slide showing that:
a) We made some decisions which we believe will make us more profitable and efficient
b) While there were some objections from a tiny minority of the community...
c) These decisions had no negative impact on our user metrics, as evidenced by <Insert juiced July numbers here>
But also, should it matter? I'm happy to let Reddit be Reddit, with the understanding that I'm not obligated to use their platform, and that there are plenty of other places online I can go to, most of which have a much stronger feeling of online community.
To people clinging to reddit, I suppose so. I don't mind (and prefer) people moving on, and I don't fault those casual browsers who don't know and don't want to know about the drama. But I do feel a bit of vicarious sadness for those who still think they have a chance to "save Reddit". I was the same way after the first blackout, but alas.
reddit laughing showing their growth in engagement for the IPO
I don't think a temporary bump in traffic due to a novelty event will be as helpful as you're suggesting.
They're not trying to help the site at all
They're trying to get one single day of huge spike and use that pretty graph to fool buyers.
It's electo-prodding a corpse for the jolt to fool a buyer: they know it's a con.
I know this is often repeated but the SEC aggressively goes after companies that try to “fool” investors.
Every IPO filing has significant explanations on the risks of the company and these things have to get mentioned. And then mentioned again in quarterlies.
If Reddit tries to bury this shit for the sake of the IPO, that is one guaranteed way to lose.
Can you help me understand how that works? How did they explain twitter to investors? The risks of never seeing their money again should be obvious, since they were never profitable and don't have a clear monetization plan, but how on earth did twitter raise billions of dollars back in 2013?
What if Reddit was truthful and presented a great looking graph 📈 correctly labeled for just one day? How does SEC aggressively go after using statistics truthfully to influence emotional reaction from a hype investor?
2013 and 2023 are very different environments. Twitter had a lot of monetisation potential at the time of IPO. That they subsequently squandered it is a different beast than Reddit IPOing in the middle of a community implosion where they risk losing a massive amount of their userbase, are no longer growing, etc
Basically, Twitter isn’t defrauding investors if their monetisation plans are plausible but merely stupid or wrong. But they WOULD BE if they had massive community issues and were simply shoving bot activity to inflate numbers so they look better than reality.
The SEC doesn’t fuck around with this. I would bet money on a lawsuit in the next few years if they keep this trend and do end up doing an IPO anyway.
But I thought fake accounts was a big issue with twitter?
19.42% apparently.
https://whatsnewinpublishing.com/19-42-of-active-twitter-accounts-are-fake-or-spam-analysis/
I guess we'll wait and see.....thanks for your insights
The article is from 2023. The SEC doesn't care about private companies (which Twitter now once-again is).
If it can be even hinted at that Twitter was posting misleading statements in their filings, pumping up the numbers etc they would have the SEC all over them.
But even now I doubt they would, because it's private again and completely out of cash.
No evidence it's temporary. It's not like /r/place is front page news and people that left reddit are going back just to place a pixel or two. It's users already there, that never left, that continue to protest on a site they claim to despise.
If your town started making bad decisions, would you begrudge those who protested in some capacity while still paying taxes there instead of moving?
Ultimately an online space cannot be held to the same level of permanence or inertia as a real place, but some level of protest is not hypocrisy or unwarranted.
When moving costs a grand total of $0 and can be done instantly with no penalties outside the site and when alternatives with a healthier environment and more honest discussion exists?
Yeah I would.
As others have pointed out the "cost" is not zero. A lot of hyper-niche or specific communities exist on reddit and nowhere else. Where else on the internet will I find the majesty of /r/vogonpoetrycircle or /r/askhistorians? And even among mainstream of big topics, the reddit community was more fun. /r/mathematics is a good example. It sucks to leave them.
Ahhhh, my spleen erupts at the sight of another vogon poetry enthusiast...
I'm gonna miss /r/frugaljerk and /r/shittydaystrom.
Search harder or make them yourselves. Reddit didn't create those communities and you don't even need a fraction of a fraction of a percent of users on a sub like AskHistorians to make a cozy replacement.
Besides, I still think it's a bit dramatic comparing some joke sub to an already niche (but well beloved) work to moving out of your house.
If conjuring up a niche community was easy, we wouldn’t even be talking about Reddit anymore.
Network effects are the force of gravity in the social world. You as an individual cannot force a new community into existence just because you want it to be.
It's not easy. But it won't be easy supposedly toppling Reddit either.
In the same way I can't make a million seller indie video game, no. But I can try.
The bright side is that I don't need to do all that technical and infrastructure work. plenty of sites exist as is today. In theory I can do a good part by becoming a power user and providing content that potential community members value. I could even advertise, though I'm certain an admin of such a new site has better logistics for that.
This all sounds like a lot, but think about how long people have complained about reddit. Think about how many posts you could contribute to a new community that aligns with your values in that time. Even if we're simply talking about a post every few weeks we're still talking hundreds of interesting posts.
This is hilariously unhelpful advice. I've personally helped build a bunch of reddit communities (in the sciences mostly, you can check my reddit account linked in my tildes profile if proof is required) and it's difficult work.
The main draw of a place like /r/askhistorians is that it's populated by real historians or people who are incredibly well versed in history. It's non-trivial to attract that kind of "talent" and build an active community.
Like I said in the original comment, there's distinct differences, but there's also an inkling of similarity in the two situations. Online spaces aren't interchangeable or intrinsically worthless -- and for some people (myself included) often more important than many of the real spaces they actually inhabit.
I'm sure it was. But you did it, probably when reddit was much less popular. You prove yourelf it's possible.
I never said it was easy. But there is no easy, quick solution here. I simply feel there are more productive uses with time and energy, especially by this point where it's clear Reddit does not care about what you and I care about.
Sure. But there's what? a few 10 thousand of those on reddit? You barely need to attract even 10 for a start. 10 regular posters mean a ton for a new community.
But I'm not in that part of the industry and I don't know what drives people to post on reddit commenting on expertise for free. I'm guessing it's very different from the tech industry so I won't try to compare past a surface level idea of a forum.
I suppose that's where we differ. If the community is right and the tech isn't overly intrusive, it shouldn't matter if I'm talking on reddit, Tildes, 4chan, or even MySpace.
I'm oversimplifying, but you hopefully understand my main point. I come to communities to seek interesting ideas and conversations. I don't particularly place much value on any one semi-anonymous individual if the ideas are interesting. That's part of why I use sites like these and not Twitter/Facebook to begin with; much less conerns of appealing to popularity or authority when there's no face behind the name.
an inkling sure. But my concerns are unchanged. If it was 1/1000th of a percent as easy to move as it was to delete my reddit account, I would have done it in a heart beat. Situations where I was scared for my life. So I do find it very facetious to compare not being able to talk with a few like-minded people with being around people who barely saw you as a person, or worse.
I'm not going to address this because I think it's a rabbit hole I'd rather not get into.
You're making well thought out arguments, and like you point out, I think we are primarily differing on priorities and values in an online community. One aspect I did not bring up of why I value the platform itself is the record of the past and the shared continuity among users who end up recognizing each other. I have over a decade of reddit comments which archive and journal a decent chunk of myself online which is organized in one place and sharable with others on the platform. This also applies to when I begin knowing the prominent members of a community and are able to read not only their concurrent posts but can dive into years' worth of thoughts and conversations they've had. In my view, the semi-autonomous nature of forums and reddit-like platforms enhances this rather than obstructs -- as I'm learning about the "real" versions of people uniquely available because of this semi-autonomous nature. To this end, I'm very excited to be a part of tildes as it grows, and I would be sad if for some reason all of this went away in a year or something. I am uniquely delighted in the few users who I knew on reddit and decided to keep their reddit usernames here as I'm not "starting from scratch" on this front.
If you build a sense of self and comfort in a community, especially if that community affords you the opportunity to express yourself in ways you cannot do so in real life, whatever the reason, it is difficult and unpleasant when forced to uproot. This is all the idea I'm trying to convey above. There's an inertia involved. The value of the online space comes about precisely because moving your real-life situation is often difficult or impossible (especially for younger folks). I probably shouldn't have used "small town moving/protests" as a metaphor because that metaphor is easily mixed with the actual reasons online spaces have value.
Perhaps. My life experience is full of uprooting and starting over, IRL and on the internet. I've never been in the same city for more than 4 years until college, and I've always rotated forums because I lurked for a very long time. So I could be less sympathetic to those who don't want to go through that given that that's been my entire life.
It can suck but it's also not the end of the world. The friends and community that really want to keep you in their life will make the steps. The truly painful part is knowing that most won't, but maybe that's a good lesson to learn. Helps you learn to find value in yourself from within instead of seeking others' validation for acceptance. I may even argue that it helps to enjoy hobbies more since you know you like it, instead of it being something you may kinda like but do to stick with friends.
I'll take my leave with one of my favorite video game quotes. Still one I strive to meet, so I don't expect anything in this conversation to result in a radical change if I still can't stick by my words:
To keep the town analogy rolling, I wouldn't blame them if the alternative with a healthier environment and more honest discussion is the equivalent of a backwoods town in northeast Montana. No offense to this site, I love it here, but it is not comparable to reddit, and I can't blame someone for staying in the equivalent of a New England megalopolis. It might generally suck there, but it's where all their friends and family live, and it's the only place they can find that one really obscure comic book store that specializes in a series that's been out of print for two decades.
You might be fine with giving up those small forums where you can discuss the hyper specific media you're into without taking on the responsibility of building that forum yourself. I'm barely okay with it, because I let my principles affect my decisions far more than I really should. I certainly don't blame anyone who stuck around because it's the only place they feel they can connect with other people.
I don't either, but if experience serves, I feel sorry for how much energy they will take to hang onto a crumbling cliff instead of starting that painful process. The sooner the better.
When the effort and cost necessary to "move" is zero, no level of hypocrisy is acceptable protest.
Hell, the cost and effort to "move" from reddit is a net positive, as time not spent on a site you claim to despise is time you get back.
If your town started making bad decisions, would you not leave if they paid you to do so?
The cost is absolutely not a net positive for a lot of us. Leaving reddit meant leaving the only place where I can talk to anyone about any of the media or hobbies I enjoy. I don't know anyone who's into astronomy or manga. The only person I know who's into anime only watches shounen. Leaving reddit was a net negative for me.
It's a bummer reading these comments, I'm seeing a lot of disdain aimed at the people who use reddit, when it's the site admins that deserve it.
Places to discuss that existed prior to reddit, they can and will exist after reddit. Just have to find them.
I have no disdain for people using reddit, I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of protesting reddit on reddit where doing so has a direct financial contribution to the entity being protested.
It's like protesting Chick-fil-a's anti-LGBT actions while ordering a sandwich or Starbucks anti-union practices with a pumpkin spice latte in your hand.
Leaving Reddit has meant losing my main source of ADHD support outside of my doctors. It was still a net gain, but I definitely feel less connected to people who have the same struggles I do.
Sure, as long as you ignore the other times r/place has been done. It always generates a bunch of new traffic but the vast majority of people who take part in it don't stick around afterwards. It's ephemeral. It's not going to magically make reddit's IPO more attractive.
Especially because there was clearly a ton of bots and not real people
You're thinking long term in a stock market full of shorts and fluctuations by the quarter. It will make their IPO more attractive and I wouldn't be surprised if the big shareholders don't care if reddit survives 2024 (probably will, but not well).
Do you have access to reddit's traffic stats to show that /r/place events show a temporary boost to the site's traffic that leaves afterward?
To be honest, that's exactly what I am doing. I have popped on a couple times, place a pixel (to fix one of the protest sections) then close the tab. Do it again when I see an article, then forget about it.
Why not, though? Engagement, unique IPs, unique IDs are all data that will be used for various justifications for their IPO. This will be a huge boon for those numbers--even if they're mostly bots.
Given the timing of this being trotted out I fully believe they (Reddit) knew the shitshow that was coming and weighed it against the increased metrics it would provide. We know their answer.
My first thought was also that this seemed to be a (successful, surely?) attempt from Reddit to demonstrate that there is still massive engagement, and that participating in r/place is simply playing into that. But the discussion here has been interesting.
I do still use Reddit sometimes. There are just some communities that aren't really replaceable for any number of reasons, and I don't really feel any guilt in going back. I've mostly stopped using Reddit for the original reasons: I don't have a good mobile app to access it. But my overall participation has definitely decreased; it was a good time to re-examine how I was using my time and what the quality of information and discussion I was being exposed to was. I don't necessarily think it's useful to treat individual Reddit participation as a moral question. Everyone just kind of has to decide for themselves whether or not they are OK using a worse app, seeing ads, worse moderation, etc.
The reason why all this drama around Reddit is so massive is because it's become sort of the sole location for information and discussion. A lot of people still search for things using search engines; they just add "reddit" because reddit is the place where information is. But that doesn't have to be true. I think building and maintaining alternatives for resources with information (that is easily searchable, like Reddit) works to build a much healthier internet. It's the fact that Reddit has become an informal archive that makes it so important.
I recognize that one of the original impetuses for this whole debacle, scraping via LLMs, isn't addressed. I feel like that kind of thing gets really complicated and I'm not yet equipped to think about it.
All this to say: I think using r/place as a protest isn't necessarily bad. It reminds the users that there are still people that care about the topic, as the protest site-wide has been well-squashed by the admin and the passage of time in general.
Disrupting service, damaging Reddit’s ability to make money, that’s a protest. Using /r/place and writing messages on it is…just normal participation. Writing “Fuck Spez” on it was not the based revolutionary action that some Redditors seem to think it was.
Shame because Reddit’s messaging has only gotten worse, in their announcement for the event they said they hoped people would direct their “passion” into submitting pixels for /r/place. Engagement of any type was their goal and…they got it.
They’re very aware people aren’t happy and they don’t care, their vision of a massive investment from an IPO is their end game now, everything else is an annoyance at worst.
My only hope is that after the IPO and Reddit’s transformation is complete that they actually bleed users and implode…but Spez and the other executives won’t care even then because they’ll have gotten their payouts and gained their status of being tech giants.
Bringing back /r/place randomly just feels wrong. If I didn't think they had lost touch with the user base before...
Is it just me? I still have access through RIF, a third party app, but only log out. Jokes on them, I never participated as a long-time lurker, so I don't mind.
But that means I still don't have to put up with the terrible GUI, I don't have ads, and I don't promote Reddit's numbers with my participation. I guess I hit the jackpot.
I believe that's how RIF is working for everyone, ever since reddit cut off the API access. I've been browsing occasionally logged out as well, which is not a great experience, so I'm not there much. But one nice thing is that I can still save subreddits on the sidebar to get around quickly, so it has more usefulness than I thought it would initially.
Fuck u/spez. I'm not on reddit... but still.