Reddit said Wednesday that the platform is revamping its privacy settings with an aim to make ad personalization and account visibility toggles consistent. Most notably though, it is removing the ability to opt out of ad personalization based on Reddit activity.
The company said that it will still have opt-out controls in “select countries” without specifying which ones. It mentioned in a blog post that users won’t see more ads but they will see better-targeted ads following this change.
Suspect the next step is the removal of old.reddit.com and Reddit Enhancement Suite to stop the ads showing. Forced into the new platform. What a shame.
Suspect the next step is the removal of old.reddit.com and Reddit Enhancement Suite to stop the ads showing. Forced into the new platform.
Isn't RES a browser extension? I have no doubt they'll kill old reddit but not sure theres much they can do about RES beyond making them change the name
Isn't RES a browser extension? I have no doubt they'll kill old reddit but not sure theres much they can do about RES beyond making them change the name
They can't remove RES, but they could in theory become hostile to it, for example by making changes to the structure and semantics of the site HTML such that RES breaks and can't keep up with...
They can't remove RES, but they could in theory become hostile to it, for example by making changes to the structure and semantics of the site HTML such that RES breaks and can't keep up with fixes. I also believe, though I'm not certain because I've had old.reddit.com set as my default since the redesign, that RES is primarily an old.reddit.com extension and has very limited functionality on new reddit.
They've already done a few things like that though. If somebody makes a post consisting of an image and text, old.reddit users sometimes won't see any of the text at all - I've seen tons of...
They've already done a few things like that though. If somebody makes a post consisting of an image and text, old.reddit users sometimes won't see any of the text at all - I've seen tons of threads where I (and many others) have been super confused about what everyone is talking about. But then I go to new.reddit and the text is right there.
So it seems to me that they are already hostile to it, and have been for a while.
Eventually, the developers of RES will lose interest and decide they've had enough and/or that reddit is no longer even worth a visit in the first place. It'll simply stop getting updates, and...
Eventually, the developers of RES will lose interest and decide they've had enough and/or that reddit is no longer even worth a visit in the first place. It'll simply stop getting updates, and eventually stop working altogether. I'm kinda surprised that hasn't already happened. :P
It's on life support, IIRC. Only two people working on it (down from ~30 in 2015). They've admitted that they won't be able to cope with any major breaking changes.
It's on life support, IIRC. Only two people working on it (down from ~30 in 2015).
They've admitted that they won't be able to cope with any major breaking changes.
Wouldn't take much. RES has been on maintenance mode since 2021, so a big enough change would be the end of the extension. The bigger question is if another extension would rise up to fill that...
Wouldn't take much. RES has been on maintenance mode since 2021, so a big enough change would be the end of the extension. The bigger question is if another extension would rise up to fill that demand if/when that happens.
I don't think they'll remove the old Reddit, even they must be knowing that most users use that version instead of new experience. In fact, I had seriously hoped that they'll revert the decision...
I don't think they'll remove the old Reddit, even they must be knowing that most users use that version instead of new experience. In fact, I had seriously hoped that they'll revert the decision and switch back to the legacy version. I still hope they will do it some day.
Depends on the definition of "most users". https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/comments/v3frc1/what_were_working_on_this_year/
Depends on the definition of "most users".
TL;DR: There are no plans to get rid of Old Reddit. 60% of mod actions still happen on Old Reddit and roughly 4% of redditors as a whole use Old Reddit every day.
Problem is, Reddit has been undergoing massive growth over the last few years. New users never knew the old design, they only knew the redesign. To them it seems acceptable, and most users are too...
Problem is, Reddit has been undergoing massive growth over the last few years. New users never knew the old design, they only knew the redesign. To them it seems acceptable, and most users are too lazy to change it get used to something and then don't want to change.
But I'd wager 90%+ of people who joined reddit after the redesign always used the redesign and haven't bothered with old reddit.
Wishful thinking. Like it or not (and I really dislike it) new reddit has the lion's share of usage now. Reddit has exploded in popularity in recent years and with new reddit being the default I...
Wishful thinking. Like it or not (and I really dislike it) new reddit has the lion's share of usage now. Reddit has exploded in popularity in recent years and with new reddit being the default I would wager most people aren't even aware of old reddit.
Reddit's promises can't be trusted so it's only a matter of time until they axe it. They already haven't bothered to fix a long standing bug that breaks links for old reddit in comments posted from new reddit. The frequency at which I see links broken in that way is just further proof at the prevalence of new reddit.
From a quick check of my subreddit statistics, most users use mobile apps, followed by new.reddit, followed by old.reddit way down in the list. It's a substantial sliver, but that's all it is, a...
I don't think they'll remove the old Reddit, even they must be knowing that most users use that version instead of new experience.
From a quick check of my subreddit statistics, most users use mobile apps, followed by new.reddit, followed by old.reddit way down in the list. It's a substantial sliver, but that's all it is, a sliver.
As far as I can tell, that means opt out in the European Union and the UK. Maybe some other countries on the periphery. Y'all need some consumer protection rights over there. Companies can just...
As far as I can tell, that means opt out in the European Union and the UK. Maybe some other countries on the periphery.
Y'all need some consumer protection rights over there. Companies can just decide on fucking over American citizens whenever they like.
You kidding? We're only a couple of plausible elections away from making corporations the only "citizens" and dumping individual suffrage altogether. I expect to see Half Life 3 before I see...
You kidding? We're only a couple of plausible elections away from making corporations the only "citizens" and dumping individual suffrage altogether.
I expect to see Half Life 3 before I see reasonable consumer protections in the US.
I really thought that it would be a huge struggle when I left at the end of the Blackout, I'd spent over a decade in the community and really did my best to contribute. But it turns out life...
I really thought that it would be a huge struggle when I left at the end of the Blackout, I'd spent over a decade in the community and really did my best to contribute. But it turns out life doesn't feel much different, maybe less chaotic. I have to search more for my news, but inversely I am not bombarded daily with sadness.
I, like probably many others here, are part of the reddit diaspora that happened as a result of the blackout. Everything you said is 100% true. I miss the smaller communities I was a part of, but...
I, like probably many others here, are part of the reddit diaspora that happened as a result of the blackout.
Everything you said is 100% true. I miss the smaller communities I was a part of, but the ones I've truly cared about, I found similar on other platforms. I don't miss the chaos, the FOMO, and the rage bait, and I think my mental health is better for it.
Like you, my struggle was where to get the news I actually care about. I ended up with the BBC News app for worldwide breaking news, 1440 newsletter, as a daily "important news" rundown from the day before, and tailoring my Google News feed by interacting with it and marking irrelevant articles.
It's made me much more of a luddite honestly. I definitely used to be one of those people who thought you could replace in person human interaction with the Internet, and I've come to the...
It's made me much more of a luddite honestly. I definitely used to be one of those people who thought you could replace in person human interaction with the Internet, and I've come to the conclusion that 1. it's just not true right now and 2. it will never be true so long as capitalism reigns.
My life is so much better for not using reddit/fb/twitter/insta. I use this site and bsky and that's it, and honestly I'm considering leaving bsky because it does just repeat a lot of the same Twitter mistakes. And yeah, like you, I don't miss it. Maybe once reddit was actually enjoyable but at some point in the last few years it stopped being fun and just started being a chore, having to scroll around people being shitty and mean for no reason.
The only use I have for reddit is as a glorified quora and the moment they try forcing login to use the site I'm blocking it at the DNS level and never looking back, and I don't think I'm the only one.
Similar for me. I've actually reengaged with some of the old forums I used to be part of. They're certainly less active, but that's fine by me. I also now have a pretty damn hefty rss library in...
Similar for me. I've actually reengaged with some of the old forums I used to be part of. They're certainly less active, but that's fine by me.
I also now have a pretty damn hefty rss library in feeder too. From apps in GitHub to forum updates to news, I've replicated everything I needed from my Reddit time. The only thing I don't have is the schadenfreude-y subs, and honestly, I'm probably better for it. My mental health and productivity have certainly increased.
It seems to be a trend with social media companies these days. I was getting spammed with ads for brush packs on Instagram the other day, so when I went I check on the option to opt out of...
It seems to be a trend with social media companies these days. I was getting spammed with ads for brush packs on Instagram the other day, so when I went I check on the option to opt out of personalized ads, the option was grayed out. It’s hilarious because that same page has a message that says we can opt out. It’s like a giant middle finger to the users.
Suspect the next step is the removal of old.reddit.com and Reddit Enhancement Suite to stop the ads showing. Forced into the new platform.
What a shame.
They just promised to not do anything to old.reddit.com a few months ago but Spez is a compulsive liar so I would expect it any time now
Other promises Reddit Inc has made around compact mode, API access and CSS for new Reddit show that their word is worth very little.
Isn't RES a browser extension? I have no doubt they'll kill old reddit but not sure theres much they can do about RES beyond making them change the name
They can't remove RES, but they could in theory become hostile to it, for example by making changes to the structure and semantics of the site HTML such that RES breaks and can't keep up with fixes. I also believe, though I'm not certain because I've had old.reddit.com set as my default since the redesign, that RES is primarily an old.reddit.com extension and has very limited functionality on new reddit.
They've already done a few things like that though. If somebody makes a post consisting of an image and text, old.reddit users sometimes won't see any of the text at all - I've seen tons of threads where I (and many others) have been super confused about what everyone is talking about. But then I go to new.reddit and the text is right there.
So it seems to me that they are already hostile to it, and have been for a while.
Eventually, the developers of RES will lose interest and decide they've had enough and/or that reddit is no longer even worth a visit in the first place. It'll simply stop getting updates, and eventually stop working altogether. I'm kinda surprised that hasn't already happened. :P
It's on life support, IIRC. Only two people working on it (down from ~30 in 2015).
They've admitted that they won't be able to cope with any major breaking changes.
Wouldn't take much. RES has been on maintenance mode since 2021, so a big enough change would be the end of the extension. The bigger question is if another extension would rise up to fill that demand if/when that happens.
Aye, it is. But they can happily butcher usability for it to not work anymore.
At this point I'm simply wondering when they ban sexially explicit content, Tumblr style. It feels inevitable at this point.
I don't think they'll remove the old Reddit, even they must be knowing that most users use that version instead of new experience. In fact, I had seriously hoped that they'll revert the decision and switch back to the legacy version. I still hope they will do it some day.
Depends on the definition of "most users".
https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/comments/v3frc1/what_were_working_on_this_year/
I would have thought it was way more than 4% - it truly is old now I guess. As am I lol
I reckon a lot of the people who ditched Reddit this summer due to their fuckery would have also been old.Reddit users. Like me.
The plural of anecdote isn't data, but I was also 100% on old.reddit before I left.
Problem is, Reddit has been undergoing massive growth over the last few years. New users never knew the old design, they only knew the redesign. To them it seems acceptable, and most users are too lazy to change it get used to something and then don't want to change.
But I'd wager 90%+ of people who joined reddit after the redesign always used the redesign and haven't bothered with old reddit.
Those feel like the same numbers that were using 3rd party apps. Which, unfortunately, leads me to believe old.reddit will be gone soon too.
Wishful thinking. Like it or not (and I really dislike it) new reddit has the lion's share of usage now. Reddit has exploded in popularity in recent years and with new reddit being the default I would wager most people aren't even aware of old reddit.
Reddit's promises can't be trusted so it's only a matter of time until they axe it. They already haven't bothered to fix a long standing bug that breaks links for old reddit in comments posted from new reddit. The frequency at which I see links broken in that way is just further proof at the prevalence of new reddit.
From a quick check of my subreddit statistics, most users use mobile apps, followed by new.reddit, followed by old.reddit way down in the list. It's a substantial sliver, but that's all it is, a sliver.
As far as I can tell, that means opt out in the European Union and the UK. Maybe some other countries on the periphery.
Y'all need some consumer protection rights over there. Companies can just decide on fucking over American citizens whenever they like.
You kidding? We're only a couple of plausible elections away from making corporations the only "citizens" and dumping individual suffrage altogether.
I expect to see Half Life 3 before I see reasonable consumer protections in the US.
Even though this news may not apply to me (I'm European), I'm still glad I don't use that site anymore.
I really thought that it would be a huge struggle when I left at the end of the Blackout, I'd spent over a decade in the community and really did my best to contribute. But it turns out life doesn't feel much different, maybe less chaotic. I have to search more for my news, but inversely I am not bombarded daily with sadness.
I, like probably many others here, are part of the reddit diaspora that happened as a result of the blackout.
Everything you said is 100% true. I miss the smaller communities I was a part of, but the ones I've truly cared about, I found similar on other platforms. I don't miss the chaos, the FOMO, and the rage bait, and I think my mental health is better for it.
Like you, my struggle was where to get the news I actually care about. I ended up with the BBC News app for worldwide breaking news, 1440 newsletter, as a daily "important news" rundown from the day before, and tailoring my Google News feed by interacting with it and marking irrelevant articles.
Deleted my account after the API changes, and it's surprised me how much I don't need it.
It's made me much more of a luddite honestly. I definitely used to be one of those people who thought you could replace in person human interaction with the Internet, and I've come to the conclusion that 1. it's just not true right now and 2. it will never be true so long as capitalism reigns.
My life is so much better for not using reddit/fb/twitter/insta. I use this site and bsky and that's it, and honestly I'm considering leaving bsky because it does just repeat a lot of the same Twitter mistakes. And yeah, like you, I don't miss it. Maybe once reddit was actually enjoyable but at some point in the last few years it stopped being fun and just started being a chore, having to scroll around people being shitty and mean for no reason.
The only use I have for reddit is as a glorified quora and the moment they try forcing login to use the site I'm blocking it at the DNS level and never looking back, and I don't think I'm the only one.
Similar for me. I've actually reengaged with some of the old forums I used to be part of. They're certainly less active, but that's fine by me.
I also now have a pretty damn hefty rss library in feeder too. From apps in GitHub to forum updates to news, I've replicated everything I needed from my Reddit time. The only thing I don't have is the schadenfreude-y subs, and honestly, I'm probably better for it. My mental health and productivity have certainly increased.
I didn't go that far. But I haven't logged in after 1st of July. And I don't miss anything.
It seems to be a trend with social media companies these days. I was getting spammed with ads for brush packs on Instagram the other day, so when I went I check on the option to opt out of personalized ads, the option was grayed out. It’s hilarious because that same page has a message that says we can opt out. It’s like a giant middle finger to the users.
Well, they've successfully chased away all the people who care about that kind of thing, so there's no reason not to go full enshittification now.
I really don't miss Reddit as much as I thought I might. I'm actually kinda sad about how much time I wasted on there during the past 14 years.