7 ms·

I wonder if an analysis of this and the comment corpus could quantifiably show shifts in the opinions of the Reddit "hivemind" since the start. Has the Reddit u

I wonder if an analysis of this and the comment corpus could quantifiably show shifts in the opinions of the Reddit "hivemind" since the start. Has the Reddit userbase turned more conservative over the years, or is that just my impression?

creshal 11y ago
There sure as hell is lot more fear-mongering since the refugee "crisis" started.
- riskneural 11y ago
  That is quite accurately reflective of what's going on in Europe right now, in fairness.
- scintill76 11y ago
  Why quotes on crisis? I'm not challenging it, because I also find it weird that overnight the phrase started popping up in the news daily. And what is the fear-mongering going on at Reddit?
  - creshal 11y ago
    > And what is the fear-mongering going on at Reddit? The usual: • The Arabs will outbreed us! (Before or after the Turks will outbreed us? Or was it the Somalis? I lost track.) • The refugees will cripple our economy! (153 million EU citizens are on tax-funded pensions or unemployment benefits. Please tell me how a million refugees is going to make a dent in that.)
    - theorique 11y ago
      They don't need to outbreed us - they are just sending us their displaced population, costing €700K per head in social services for "integration". And of those refugees "integrated" at vast expense, how many are already ISIS operatives? How many will be radicalized and return with full bellies and full bank accounts to fight for jihad in Syria and Iraq? Europe is doing the wrong thing.
- TorKlingberg 11y ago
  I think American redditors just don't care much, and there has been a lot of racism in European parts of Reddit for some time.
- SippinLean 11y ago
  3.7 million people that now are the largest refugee population in the world. You can leave off the quotes.
- archagon 11y ago
  I find that /r/news and /r/worldnews are just utter cesspits of terrible, racist comments. Some people say they're brigaded by Stormfront... dunno if that's true or not, but I wouldn't be surprised.
aunty_helen 11y ago
It would also be interesting to see the development of astroturffing campaigns from a marketing and also a tinfoil hat perspective.
socket0 11y ago
You will most likely find a shift in the hive mind, but presumably only because Reddit grew from a smaller community with relatively dominant progressive and atheist/agnostic values into something much more mainstream. Reddit 2006 would not reflect mainstream US values and opinions, Reddit 2015 would be much closer. So I'm not sure we can draw any conclusions from the hive mind shift.
- ebbv 11y ago
  > Reddit 2006 would not reflect mainstream US values and opinions, Reddit 2015 would be much closer. While I agree Reddit 2015 does reflect more of the US mainstream, it is still far from being an actual reflection of popular US opinion. Reddit is far more atheist/libertarian than the US mainstream. And I would argue it is right now far more reactionary/right wing as well. It has become very popular among young white males who have unhealthy attitudes towards women due to the abundance of porn and generally retrograde attitudes towards women of Reddit in general (both the users and the site itself.) Same goes for its attitudes towards race.
  - mason240 11y ago
    > young white males who have unhealthy attitudes towards women due to the abundance of porn You sound just like the fundamentalist Evangelicals I grew up with.
    - ebbv 11y ago
      It appears you didn't understand the sentence you are partially quoting. Reddit itself is full of porn. Much like attitudes towards women are likely to be generally more misogynistic among the patrons of a strip club than they are, say, inside of a planned parenthood, not just the presence but the omnipresence of porn on Reddit, and the role the porn plays in Reddit's popularity has an effect on the site and its users as a whole. If you're going to claim that it has no effect, then you're delusional. And my point is not that porn is bad or porn should be banned or whatever kind of crap you're trying to ascribe to me with your ridiculous comment. So, settle down there, Chester, and try actually reading what someone writes before responding to it. Try to actually comprehend the point and don't just react with the first knee-jerk thing that comes to mind.
hugh4 11y ago
"More diverse" is, I believe, the term you're looking for. On reddit circa 2006, everybody had the same views on everything from politics to movies to cats to spiders. Eventually it acquired a more diverse cross-section of the population. Of course, they've been doing their best over the past few months to crack down on the expression of views they don't like, so I'm not sure what the demographic looks like nowadays and how many people have fled to less censorship-happy pastures. It's also possible that young people are becoming more conservative overall. Conservatism is looking a lot better ever since the idiocy of the Bush administration got replaced by the idiocy of the Obama administration.
- rifung 11y ago
  Perhaps this is not the right thread for it, but what exactly about the Obama administration is idiotic? I'm ashamed to say I don't really follow politics.
  - mason240 11y ago
    Just one example is the "Cars for Clunkers" program, where the government bought old cars just to destroy them. It was supposed to be both an environmental and economic stimulus, but in reality was bad for the environment and is just a form of the Broken Window Fallacy.
    - s1lver 11y ago
      It sold a ton of kia souls, and by my figgering probably got most people 10-20 extra miles per gallon. Not that it makes up for the tragic deaths of many big engined classics....
memeda 11y ago
️️ / l \ / l \ / l \ / l \
samstave 11y ago
Can you take a a sentiment of certain trends in what people are talking about regarding [subject] and turn it into either better marketing or profiting off sentiments in the market?
ALee 11y ago
You could probably just take the same methodology as the Poole-Rosenthal index for partisan politics in the United States. It's always the most widely cited for the current state of divisiveness in politics and I think could be applied here.
ALee 11y ago
You could probably just take the same methodology as the Poole-Rosenthal index for partisan politics in the United States. It's always the most widely cited for the current state of divisiveness in politics and I think could be applied here.

creshal 11y ago

There sure as hell is lot more fear-mongering since the refugee "crisis" started.

riskneural 11y ago
That is quite accurately reflective of what's going on in Europe right now, in fairness.
scintill76 11y ago
Why quotes on crisis? I'm not challenging it, because I also find it weird that overnight the phrase started popping up in the news daily. And what is the fear-mongering going on at Reddit?
- creshal 11y ago
  > And what is the fear-mongering going on at Reddit? The usual: • The Arabs will outbreed us! (Before or after the Turks will outbreed us? Or was it the Somalis? I lost track.) • The refugees will cripple our economy! (153 million EU citizens are on tax-funded pensions or unemployment benefits. Please tell me how a million refugees is going to make a dent in that.)
  - theorique 11y ago
    They don't need to outbreed us - they are just sending us their displaced population, costing €700K per head in social services for "integration". And of those refugees "integrated" at vast expense, how many are already ISIS operatives? How many will be radicalized and return with full bellies and full bank accounts to fight for jihad in Syria and Iraq? Europe is doing the wrong thing.
TorKlingberg 11y ago
I think American redditors just don't care much, and there has been a lot of racism in European parts of Reddit for some time.
SippinLean 11y ago
3.7 million people that now are the largest refugee population in the world. You can leave off the quotes.
archagon 11y ago
I find that /r/news and /r/worldnews are just utter cesspits of terrible, racist comments. Some people say they're brigaded by Stormfront... dunno if that's true or not, but I wouldn't be surprised.

aunty_helen 11y ago

It would also be interesting to see the development of astroturffing campaigns from a marketing and also a tinfoil hat perspective.

socket0 11y ago

You will most likely find a shift in the hive mind, but presumably only because Reddit grew from a smaller community with relatively dominant progressive and atheist/agnostic values into something much more mainstream. Reddit 2006 would not reflect mainstream US values and opinions, Reddit 2015 would be much closer. So I'm not sure we can draw any conclusions from the hive mind shift.

ebbv 11y ago
> Reddit 2006 would not reflect mainstream US values and opinions, Reddit 2015 would be much closer. While I agree Reddit 2015 does reflect more of the US mainstream, it is still far from being an actual reflection of popular US opinion. Reddit is far more atheist/libertarian than the US mainstream. And I would argue it is right now far more reactionary/right wing as well. It has become very popular among young white males who have unhealthy attitudes towards women due to the abundance of porn and generally retrograde attitudes towards women of Reddit in general (both the users and the site itself.) Same goes for its attitudes towards race.
- mason240 11y ago
  > young white males who have unhealthy attitudes towards women due to the abundance of porn You sound just like the fundamentalist Evangelicals I grew up with.
  - ebbv 11y ago
    It appears you didn't understand the sentence you are partially quoting. Reddit itself is full of porn. Much like attitudes towards women are likely to be generally more misogynistic among the patrons of a strip club than they are, say, inside of a planned parenthood, not just the presence but the omnipresence of porn on Reddit, and the role the porn plays in Reddit's popularity has an effect on the site and its users as a whole. If you're going to claim that it has no effect, then you're delusional. And my point is not that porn is bad or porn should be banned or whatever kind of crap you're trying to ascribe to me with your ridiculous comment. So, settle down there, Chester, and try actually reading what someone writes before responding to it. Try to actually comprehend the point and don't just react with the first knee-jerk thing that comes to mind.

hugh4 11y ago

"More diverse" is, I believe, the term you're looking for. On reddit circa 2006, everybody had the same views on everything from politics to movies to cats to spiders. Eventually it acquired a more diverse cross-section of the population. Of course, they've been doing their best over the past few months to crack down on the expression of views they don't like, so I'm not sure what the demographic looks like nowadays and how many people have fled to less censorship-happy pastures. It's also possible that young people are becoming more conservative overall. Conservatism is looking a lot better ever since the idiocy of the Bush administration got replaced by the idiocy of the Obama administration.

rifung 11y ago
Perhaps this is not the right thread for it, but what exactly about the Obama administration is idiotic? I'm ashamed to say I don't really follow politics.
- mason240 11y ago
  Just one example is the "Cars for Clunkers" program, where the government bought old cars just to destroy them. It was supposed to be both an environmental and economic stimulus, but in reality was bad for the environment and is just a form of the Broken Window Fallacy.
  - s1lver 11y ago
    It sold a ton of kia souls, and by my figgering probably got most people 10-20 extra miles per gallon. Not that it makes up for the tragic deaths of many big engined classics....

memeda 11y ago

️️ / l \ / l \ / l \ / l \

samstave 11y ago

Can you take a a sentiment of certain trends in what people are talking about regarding [subject] and turn it into either better marketing or profiting off sentiments in the market?

ALee 11y ago

You could probably just take the same methodology as the Poole-Rosenthal index for partisan politics in the United States. It's always the most widely cited for the current state of divisiveness in politics and I think could be applied here.

ALee 11y ago