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Reddit app got 50M downloads by making mobile web experience miserable
- billman 6y agoFacebook is going down the same road with forcing you to install messenger if you have messages.
- hocuspocus 6y agoThe worst thing is that the official app isn't even that great, at least on Android. Every time I try it, I quickly go back to a 3rd party (Boost at the moment).
- pilif 6y agoif it was great, they wouldn't need to push for it this much. This is about getting access to more tracking and more immersive ads than what a web browser allows, not about offering a good user experience.
- ajsnigrutin 6y agoBoost app is great! ...so reddit will probably soon first cripple it and then ban it...
- mads 6y agoAnd lost at least one user. I mostly stopped going to Reddit because of the miserable mobile experience, which is how I would normally consume the content there.
- austhrow743 6y agoi.reddit.com
- orangepanda 6y agoTo be fair, desktop web experience isnt much better
- colechristensen 6y agoold.reddit.com still works
- PikachuEXE 6y agoHope it won't be dumped forever
- ffpip 6y agoIt's already missing the new 'features'. - Chat and non-email sign in. Gallery view could be a bit better on old.reddit.com.
- hombre_fatal 6y agoAre you talking about something else? old.reddit.com has chat, and you register without an email by clicking "Next".
- ffpip 6y agoBy non-email, I meant the newly implemented Google and Apple ID sign in methods
- Havoc 6y agoThey did say it'll stick around long term when the change was made. Whether that's a promise that will be kept remains to be seen
- vertbhrtn 6y agoThe rule of thumb: if the corporate says something, they lie.
- DarthGhandi 6y agoRedreader for Android. Free and Open Source. It's on fdroid and playstore
- notRobot 6y agoI don't want an app for Reddit. I don't care which one it is. It's a simple website, let me use it in my fucking browser. Lightweight! Easy to block ads and tracking! Multiple tabs! You can leave pages open in your browser and read them later! Bookmarkable! No proprietary app! No app updates! No spammy notifications! No use of Google Play Services! No taking up of dozens of GBs on my phone! RES!
- nindalf 6y ago> dozens of GBs Hyperbole detracts from the point you're trying to make. Everyone reading your comment knows how much space apps take on their phones.
- mschuster91 6y ago> Everyone reading your comment knows how much space apps take on their phones. The problem here is caching, as in-app caches have different caches than the global system.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- notRobot 6y agoYeah I meant MB, that was a typo. My bad. Point still stands. The Reddit app on Android is 36 MB. Why does a simple message board app need to be so big?
- durzagott 6y agoThere's always i.reddit.com It satisfies most of your requirements
- throwaway45349 6y ago
- alangibson 6y agoFunny how many comments on that post say 3rd party apps are better than the official one. Reddit shuts down their API in 3, 2, 1...
- napolux 6y agoApollo on iOS is a wonderful app, plus, it has no ads while the official one is full of banners if you're not a premium user.
- chrysoprace 6y agoAs much as people sing praises of Apollo, it's very unhelpful that it's an iOS-only app. I don't understand why platform-exclusive apps are a thing in this day and age.
- raverbashing 6y agoYeah let them try it The new desktop interface is unusable. Really. It might work for 9gag kind of shallow content but not for a "frontpage" thing.
- alangibson 6y agoI just opened reddit.com for the first time in I don't know how long. Amazing. The actual content starts 2/3rds of the way down the screen. All the media is unfurled so I can see all of one headline on the home page.
- ffpip 6y agoFrames with frames within frames. Try opening a video and see your computer heat up.
- Hammershaft 6y agoI have seen my enthusiast desktop rig rev up and slow to a crawl just by scrolling down reddit. I have seen a collection of ~10 reddit tabs work on 6 (!!!) gigs of ram. Reddit has become a condensed form of all that is so awful about modern web design. I used to love using reddit to find interesting niche communities, it was my primary way of engaging with the internet. These days I just hope it dies faster so that those communities can migrate to a better platform.
- rickdg 6y agoApple has taught us well.
- Causality1 6y agoImgur, the Reddit image hosting offshoot, did precisely the same thing. They slowly began stripping features from the site starting with direct messaging and eventually prevented mobile users from logging in at all.
- avian 6y agoWhat is Imgur’s business model these days? The app doesn’t have any (obvious) ads. There’s a small banner on the bottom, but for me it’s always just advertising Imgur’s own features. There was a time when they were pushing ads heavily on the app (like full screen ads you had to swipe away), but that apparently didn’t work out.
- Nextgrid 6y ago"Growth and engagement" is the "business" model. I'm assuming they're pushing their own features to inflate their subscriber numbers so they can try and sell out to a bigger fish.
- plasma 6y agoSurprisingly, its when I'm logged in to the mobile website that I wish the 'Open in app' button was there (to make commenting easier), but I'm only harassed to open the app when I'm logged out.
- the-dude 6y agoWell, to be fair, if the button would be there, there would be another HN user complaining about the nagging to install the app even when I'm logged in!.
- ffpip 6y agoYou can turn it off. The hamburger menu on the top right. That>settings>Ask to open in App. If you clear cookies, you have to do it again.
- random_visitor 6y agoWhile not exactly a fix for your case, Firefox on android has a prompt for opening sites in their apps if it's installed on your device. Match that with its extension support and it makes most of the mobile web far less obnoxious.
- ffpip 6y agoI want to thank the admins that made the app and the web one of the worst. You helped cure my reddit addiction. I now open it only once or twice a month. You cannot view comment replies on the web. You cannot view any sub on the web. You cannot even read full comments. Seriously. Thanks. I even started studying for my exams!
- kabacha 6y agoYou can still browser old UI without any of these issues via https://old.reddit.com https://old.reddit.com AFAIK
- cpach 6y agoEven if that’s possible I personally feel that if those who run Reddit don’t want to web experience to be user-focused then I feel that I don’t want to spend my time there. I rather use HN or Lobsters instead.
- IPTN 6y agoI'd never heard of Lobsters before, I am assuming you are referring to this site: https://lobste.rs/ https://lobste.rs/ Looks interesting, thanks!
- mtrpcic 6y agoYou can even set the old UI to be your default in your preferences, so it will even render the old UI on the standard domain.
- Daniel_sk 6y agoRecently I noticed that using ad blockers on iPhone will break the reddit mobile website - it will not allow you to scroll unless the annoying "use our app" popup shows from the bottom and you must click no. Some blockers like 1BlockerX or maybe Wipr block these annoyances and will lead to a broken un-scrollable reddit website. This started happening only recently and I wonder if this was a deliberate decision to also annoy users of ad blockers.
- vasachi 6y agoOh, so thats what it is. I honestly thought that they somehow implemented scroll in js, and it doesn't work in safari, because reddit engineers didn't test it :)
- ffpip 6y agouBlock Origin can remove all those popups on Reddit, Quora, Instagram, Pinterest. Enable uBlock Annoyances in the filter lists.
- smt88 6y agoYou can't use uBlock Origin on iOS. All iOS browsers are Safari.
- whywhywhywhy 6y agoI understand Apples logic for trying to build their own AdBlocker ecosystem but honestly browsing with Safari feels so unsafe now without uBlock Origin. Keep seeing ads slip through and it's not just standard banners it's the sort of ads that look like they'll give you malware if you mis-clicked them.
- MaxikCZ 6y agoAnd then the scrolling wont work, if I understand parent comment correctly
- ffpip 6y ago
- sanqui 6y agoThe "dot compact" version of the Reddit website still has the best mobile UI to me, though I rarely use it. https://www.reddit.com/.compact https://www.reddit.com/.compact
- alborzb 6y agoAlso loads by going to https://i.reddit.com https://i.reddit.com
- alangibson 6y agoIt's always interesting to see how the value of communities gets concentrated and captured. 1. Communities for around disparate forums 2. Those communities migrate to centralized service because of more eyeballs in one place, less work to maintain infrastructure, etc. 3. Centralized service captures increasing amount of value by running more ads, closing off more open channels, etc. This is clearly the lifecycle for Facebook, Reddit, and arguably Google. My question is: what's step 4? Are communities going to start unbundling, or does this trend just continue?
- sefrost 6y agoThis article about unbundling Reddit made the rounds recently https://latecheckout.substack.com/p/the-guide-to-unbundling-reddit https://latecheckout.substack.com/p/the-guide-to-unbundling-...
- alangibson 6y agoThe unbundling concept is making the rounds through the 'indie hacker' community. I've heard it mentioned a few podcasts recently. It'll be interesting to see what business spring up in the next couple of years that chip pieces off of Facebook and Reddit. I wonder if in a century we'll understand the economy of the Internet as constantly oscillating between concentration and decentralization.
- ZephyrBlu 6y agoI think the communities that will be 'unbundled' are the ones that want to get away from memes and foster a more discussion-orientated community. All other content gets drowned out by memes eventually, which is a real shame.
- dredmorbius 6y agoThat concept traces back to unbundling Craigslist, from 2010: https://thegongshow.tumblr.com/post/345941486/the-spawn-of-craigslist-like-most-vcs-that-focus https://thegongshow.tumblr.com/post/345941486/the-spawn-of-c... (That's been submitted to HN but with no traction to date: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=spawn%20of%20craigslist&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...)
- raesene9 6y agoEven when you get past the annoying pop-ups, reddit on mobile is still a pain, slow and misses a lot of taps. My solution to this has been to use old.reddit.com, which is (IME) a much nicer experience, faster and more responsive.
- gvjddbnvdrbv 6y agoI think reddit have forgotten about old.reddit.com. Maybe we shouldn't talk about it in case they notice and shut it down...
- varbhat 6y agouse https://i.reddit.com https://i.reddit.com on mobile
- tjpnz 6y agoThose maintaining the web app must have a miserable existence. It's never fun having your work undermined like this, especially when so much care has gone into it.
- fareesh 6y agoBacon Reader is a good app for their platform
- yuppiepuppie 6y agoI find the new reddit UI to be terrible, and still use old.reddit.com. I just hope they continue to host it. If they shut it down at some point, I will probably stop using reddit. And that will be a sad day.
- mark_mart 6y agoSame, I will not use Reddit website without their old version. I simply can't stand to the new ugly 'modern' UI of they use.
- pixelpoet 6y agoTheir idea of a "modern" look is Fisher Price.
- mrweasel 6y agoEvery now an then I try the new UI, I haven't in a while though. Every time the experience was the same, horribly slow and confusing. I think the Reddit plan was to switch the users to an eternal scrolling, sort of like Facebook, to keep users on the site longer, but that really ruins the experience for pretty much everything but pure entertainment. If anything I'm all little pissed at both Facebook and Reddit for killing forums, than the changing their platforms that aren't really suited for forum like discussions when they discovered that it's not actually profitable to run forums. The communities on both have devolved over time, so it's perhaps not a big loss. Reddit in particular have grown to have what I would call "accepted opinions", they may differ slightly in different sub-reddits. The Reddit community is, in general, stubborn, narrow minded and intolerant for different opinions and world views, but disguises it as left leaning politics, anti-racism, feminism and inclusiveness while behaving exactly like the people they claim to be against. There's still a few positive and supportive sub-reddits, but the main ones are lost.
- alternatetwo 6y agoReddit Enhancement Suite has had "Never Ending Reddit" forever and it worked (works) without crazy performance issues ...
- PopeDotNinja 6y agoFor months I thought there was no way to collapse a comment thread using the mobile site. Then one day I accidentally clicked on a comment timestamp and the thread collapsed. Which makes sense, because nothing say “hide these comments” like the text “17 minutes ago” :P
- vidarh 6y agoThe posting time is linked on HN too (shows that comment as root of a sub-thread, and shows additional options)
- ilogik 6y agoI expect that to happen. it's the same on twitter for example. but I'm not expecting the action to be to collapse the thread
- kilroy123 6y agoI'm glad to read I'm not the only one. I thought it was insanity you couldn't collapse a thread until I stumbled upon this.
- golergka 6y agoI've recently got a new MacBook. Top of the line, i9 cpu, 64 gbs of RAM. Reddit desktop site still lags on it, client-side.
- jamil7 6y agoI wonder when the reckoning for poorly built single page javascript apps will come. Or are we already seeing it with users switching to native apps for social media?
- Havoc 6y agoold.reddit.com all the way. Everything they've changed since that "upgrade" has been user hostile cancer. They're at real risk of becoming another digg I think
- timdaub 6y agoI'm kinda surprised nobody has said this about Instagram. Formerly, without an account, you were able to easily browse all content for an unlimited time. Now, after a certain amount of actions or time, it asks you to log in.
- ffpip 6y agoIf you use uBlock Origin, enable the 'Ublock Annoyances' Filter list. Removes all the login crap on Insta, Pinterest, Quora and imgur.
- robin_reala 6y agoI think it’s because Instagram started life as a pure-iOS app with no web environment at all.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- varbhat 6y agoUse https://github.com/Docile-Alligator/Infinity-For-Reddit https://github.com/Docile-Alligator/Infinity-For-Reddit https://github.com/QuantumBadger/RedReader https://github.com/QuantumBadger/RedReader https://i.reddit.com https://i.reddit.com https://old.reddit.com https://old.reddit.com
- mouldysammich 6y agothere is also https://github.com/ccrama/Slide https://github.com/ccrama/Slide Its very nice.
- ihadtosayit 6y agoOr alternatively, stop supporting and using services from a corporation that actively works against its users.
- eska 6y agoAdd ceddit.com to that list. It will cure your reddit addiction real quick.
- dredmorbius 6y agoThe https://tildes.net https://tildes.net implementation is quite good ;-)
- harha 6y agoSounds like good old corporate to me, the boss says you won’t get your bonus unless there are x app installs, the product manager replies “hold my beer and watch this”. This is a serious issue for users though and should highlight the risks with handing off control over important communication platforms.
- knorker 6y agoI thought this article would be about the desktop UI's infinite scroll.[1] If they ever remove the ability to opt out of infinite scroll I'm out. There has to be that natural stopping point or know I can't even start. [1] well, and everything else that makes the new design absolutely unusable.
- MaxikCZ 6y agotbh, I never understood the hate for the infinite scrolling in a domain of natural stopping point.. I have this problem with pages too.. "Just one more page..." My main issue is when I accidentaly dont open link in new tab, and pressing back makes the page reload and I loose my scrolling progress..
- knorker 6y agoYeah, it's awful for multiple reasons.
- jwr 6y agoThis is a generally trending idea: make your users' experience miserable, improve short-term numbers, lose in the longer term. We're seeing the same pattern with ad-loaded sites, "Your ad choices" popups with those terrible "Manage My Preferences" dialogs — I'm sure all those result in quarterly bonuses for a bunch of managers. But they are not the Right Thing to Do, and will come to bite back in the long term.
- bleepblorp 6y agoEating the future seed corn in the hopes of higher profits now has been the business model of choice for most companies for the past 40 years, ever since compensation for senior management became directly linked to stock prices. Allowing executives to walk away with short-term gains but stick shareholders (and/or the public) with long-term losses broke many, many things in corporate governance and society in general. It's no coincidence that quality of life measures began to stagnate when this became the normal way to do business.
- lotsofpulp 6y agoHow is compensation in equity short term? It usually comes with a vesting period so that the reward is in the future. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/stockcompensation.asp https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/stockcompensation.asp https://www.equilar.com/reports/3-equity-vesting-schedules.html https://www.equilar.com/reports/3-equity-vesting-schedules.h... The only thing that could incentivize more long term performance would be even longer vesting periods, but that comes with downsides too.
- marvin 6y agoIn one sense it’s sort of a moot point, as companies that hire this type of executive will in the long term be driven out of business by those who don’t. But I don’t think you can properly incentivize people to avoid this class of mistake (short-term thinking) unless top leadership are themselves long-term owners. Long-term owners would be very interested in avoiding this mistake, though. But it does present a bit of a tax on e.g. public companies with fragmented ownership.
- treelovinhippie 6y agoPost title before the mods inevitably change it: "Reddit app got 50M downloads by making mobile web experience miserable"
- treelovinhippie 6y agoOh look at that... the title changed. How predictable.
- dewey 6y agoIf Apollo on iOS wouldn't be around I'd just not use Reddit. I'm not even logged in in the browser as just opening the website makes my fans spin.
- jamil7 6y agoApollo is fantastic and the only reason I still read reddit. If they try to shutdown the API or try to acquire it and kill it (alien blue) I think I'd lose interest.
- rcarmo 6y agoI largely agree with this. On iOS, I can’t actually get past the pop-up on their homepage, which (infuriatingly) prevents me from scrolling. It might be my adblocker, but IMHO whomever did that to their mobile homepage ought to be given at least a very stern talking to. And whomever got them to code it ought to be fired.
- Daniel_sk 6y agoYes, it's the adblocker. I had the issue with 1BlockerX - I had to turn it off for reddit on iOS :-(. Other adblockers either have the same issue or the developers added specific code to battle this (e.g. AdGuard https://forum.adguard.com/index.php?threads/resolved-reddit-mobile-scrolling-issue.35669/ https://forum.adguard.com/index.php?threads/resolved-reddit-...). This must be a deliberate tactic from Reddit.
- hn3333 6y agoLinkedIn makes communication between users miserable unless you pay. Copyright holders make distribution miserable unless you pay etc. Not judging any of those as bad, just saying that it's not uncommon for providers of products or services to limit them.
- teddyh 6y ago“Here is another point that helps put the problem of proprietary information in a social perspective. Think about the liability insurance crisis. In order to get any compensation from society, an injured person has to hire a lawyer and split the money with that lawyer. This is a stupid and inefficient way of helping out people who are victims of accidents. And consider all the time that people put into hustling to take business away from their competition. Think of the pens that are packaged in large cardboard packages that cost more than the pen—just to make sure that the pen isn't stolen. Wouldn't it be better if we just put free pens on every street corner? And think of all the toll booths that impede the flow of traffic. It's a gigantic social phenomenon. People find ways of getting money by impeding society. Once they can impede society, they can be paid to leave people alone. The waste inherent in owning information will become more and more important […]” (emphasis mine) — Richard Stallman, 1986 https://www.gnu.org/gnu/byte-interview https://www.gnu.org/gnu/byte-interview
- INTPenis 6y agoThat title is wrong for at least one user, me. I think the mobile app is great, if you only look at its features and its ability to deliver Reddit content and discussion. I volunteered for the Reddit beta, even though I am a proponent of minimalistic and simple websites. To be honest it is very resource heavy. Even selecting text has a 1.5s delay in the WYSIWYG editor. But overall it's not much different than other content heavy websites online.
- pedrogpimenta 6y ago> I think the mobile app is great Yes, but they article says the mobile WEB experience is terrible. And that's practically not opinionable, it's a fact.
- brailsafe 6y agoI did some digging into the WYSIWYG editoe and found a memory leak they introduced. This was quite a while ago, but there's a good chance it's still there.
- vertbhrtn 6y agoBefore you comment on technicalities, remember that reddit's management consciously caters to the emotional people, and managing such a platform is very different than HN. I'd even admit the possibility that the plain and dry UI of HN would look unappealing to the reddit folks.
- yes_man 6y agoBeing interested in tech and startups probably doesn't mean you are less emotional than people who aren't
- vertbhrtn 6y agoWell, it does. If we make a random sample of 1 million people that are interested in tech and startups, then another million of those that aren't, measure the average "emotional charge" of both groups, we'll notice a huge statistically significant difference between the two averages.
- yes_man 6y agoCan you back that up with some research or are you just basing that assumption on your emotions? What even is "emotional charge"? I bet that emotional capability of people isn't tied to their interest in startups and tech
- smt88 6y agoIt is incredibly weird that you're an elitist about emotions, that you think "emotional people" is not just "people", and that you believe a UI designer can create interfaces for those two separate audiences. Is craigslist also a UI for unemotional people? It's pretty dry. What about MDN docs? They have a great, friendly, usable UI. Surely that must be designed for emotional people, right?
- vertbhrtn 6y agoI agree with every point you've made here except the last one: the MDN docs are very dry, precisely because they are designed for knowledge-first people.
- pea 6y agoAm presuming this is distinct from the problems with the main website (i.e. they aren't trying to push people off of that too), but maybe related in the sense that it seems the strategy is to turn the website into an app instead of keeping it as a website. IMHO, this isn't a good fit for what I use reddit for, which is a collection of linked documents - where 'normal' server-rendered documents worked really well. It doesn't really need to be an app, and building it as an app bloats it for my use-case. I'm not sure if it's due to odd FE architecture choices or if this specifically helps increase bottom-line KPIs, but there are some bizarre things like the fact that clicking on the background of a post takes you back to the subreddit via replacing history (?), which kind of breaks the idea of how you expect a website to work. What confuses me from an architecture POV is there are glaring high-value things they could fix - like subreddit search, image hosting etc. - that get left.
- rozab 6y agoMost Reddit users now seem to think Reddit is an app, not a website.
- jarym 6y agoWell it worked - millions of people could be bullied into downloading an app for a website like this. Why wouldn’t companies do what works?
- read_if_gay_ 6y agoI would think those who create the content reddit is living off are less likely to get bullied into downloading an app. Long term, the content becomes garbage and the regular users leave too.
- wildpeaks 6y agoMy worry is that some exec will think of this as a success story, that making the web experience miserable is a totally fine way to drive engagement on their mobile app and will push other sites to do the same.
- WULB_HELL_ 6y agoThey absolutely will. They will also look at the interaction and engagement rates on those awful popups and nag messages and consider them a huge success too. People clicking on those garbage dialogs either by accident or to try to make them go away = Number Go Up = Users must like this UI element.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- derEitel 6y agoNo one mentioning Facebook? Them forcing you to use the messenger app to be able to communicate on the mobile is using the same strategy. I have to use a different browser and use desktop mode to see messages. Writing then becomes horrible too. Not using fb messenger at all anymore an complain to people who text me on there.
- c-fe 6y agoJust fyi, you can use mbasic.facebook.com ... Still horrible, but at least you can communicate to some degree without any app, I used it for a month while being stuck with an old phone.
- MaxBarraclough 6y agoAn unfortunate U-turn. For a long term they declined to offer an official mobile app, and were purely focused on the web.
- tifadg1 6y agoHorrible reddit behavior fixed my reddit mobile browsing addiction. Horrible firefox update fixed my hn mobile browsing addiction. Forced slowness on my phone fixed my addiction to play games there. Forced windows updates fixed my laziness to switch to linux full time.
- dt3ft 6y agoThis is exactly why I started working on 20-things.com with a firm stand on not doing what Reddit has been doing - pushing people to mobile app in order to be able to track and show them ads (adblockers won't work in the app of course). How can I achieve this? By limiting the community size to a certain number of people so that it can stay self-sustainable. This could be a few thousand users, and then the door gets closed to new registrations.
- rawoke083600 6y agoSeems down for me ?
- tenbino 6y agoI’d respect Reddit more if it simply said “Reddit on mobile is only available via our app”. At least then I wouldn’t feel in a world of sleazy manipulation.
- say_it_as_it_is 6y agoReddit is the poster child of single page applications. It is slow, consumes more resources, and is visually overloading. I'm not surprised that it has difficulty with mobile browsers. It doesn't even do well with desktop ones.
- fc373745 6y agoThere is a phenomenon when older and older groups enter a social platform, the quality of that platform deteriorates for the younger generation, and perhaps maybe even overall. We saw this with facebook, We saw this with twitter, and we're now seeing this with Reddit. (yes, there is twitter outside of tech, and it's content quality is extremely poor and juvenile) Reddit, at one point, was just science, memes, an occasional atheist post, and and A list Celebrity AMA every other day - a platform that provided niche content mostly for age 18-30 year old Americans. Now with the flood of all sorts of ideas from all fronts, It has become way too overwhelming to really digest what everyone has to offer - Diving deep into reddit will eventually and inevitably get anyone upset and bothered. As Reddit builds its foundation upon favoring ad populum, it is starting to become evident that not every voice should be heard, especially when the average american individual is as uneducated as he or she is. “Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'” ― Isaac Asimov I'd like to one up Asimov - that it is not a false notion, but literally the core tenet of what democracy is. That all opinions are of equal value. And in all honesty... this is dangerous.
- prox 6y agoInsightful comment. This falls in line with conspiracy theories: while on the whole its good to be critical or skeptic, when you use all kinds of extraneous data points to make it fit your pre-chosen theory, it no longer is science.
- mhaberl 6y agoIn democracy two stupid people have more power than one smart individual. On the other side what kind of existing system is better than democracy?
- pbhjpbhj 6y agoIf you have enough money you can buy the influencing of a lot of less analytical people. In the UK we combat that by strict regulations on money spent influencing voters. Sadly, despite proving Brexit campaigns were backed by an excessive amount of money routed through a Russian oligarch the result remains (unintended ironic use of 'remain'!). Democracy can only work with probity. If the people don't know the truth they can't vote for their choice. Benevolent dictatorship seems likely the better option, just choose your dictator carefully!
- brailsafe 6y agoNot only are the obvious things miserable, but they also introduced a memory leak to their post/comment creation interface (I did report, ironically using the same interface). Today I discovered that the website will crash in Firefox if you try to find in page—presumably after a certain point it triggers a conflict with their infinite scroll implementation.
- donatj 6y agoI just use old.reddit.com on my phone. I find the experience much better.
- icemelt8 6y agoHeadline: For profit company takes a decision to earn profits to pay salaries. BooHoo
- r721 6y agoRecent reddit app discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24208958 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24208958 (650 comments)
- noneeeed 6y agoThe funny thing about this tactic is that it's put me right off the idea of using the app. If this is what their engineering is like, why would I want their app installed on my phone? My assumption is that it's a dumpster-fire of trackers, dark UX patterns and be just poor quality. I wonder what I'd do if someone from Reddit applied for a job on my team. I'd certainly be _very_ interested in their thoughts on the Reddit approach.
- reagent_finder 6y agoI actually got used to the mobile web, it's okay IMO. Certainly better than the new web layout. What's terrible is the beta tests they constantly run on small variations of the populace, without your knowledge and without any way of giving feedback. They honestly don't give a crap. They also actively hide the ways to give feedback and ignore it when it's given. That said, it's someone's day job to clock in, fiddle with the mobile web UI according to manager and C-level concerns and clock out, with the occasional "So what is it that you actually do here?" meeting. I'd probably stop giving two shits after a month or so.
- thinkingemote 6y agoFirefox on android had a plugin that would remove the nags and redirects which made reading Reddit acceptable, until Firefox removed all (but 6) plugins.
- timvisee 6y agoIt is insane how bad the web interface is for something this big.
- asah 6y agoLinkedIn and Yelp: hold my beer.
- freyr 6y agoLots of justified criticism here about the mobile web Reddit, which is horrible. But the desktop web Reddit has become unusable for me as well. My laptop heats up, the fans go into overdrive, and my browser slows to a crawl. It’s the anti-HN.
- reeestandard 6y agoI feel bad for the engineers because surely they knew the new site was incredibly slow and poorly optimised, so it must have been pushed through by management. It looks alright, but dear god the performance.
- HumblyTossed 6y ago> ... because surely they knew the new site was incredibly slow and poorly optimised... I wouldn't be so sure. It really depends on the quality of the engineers. And if they're quality why are they working for Reddit pushing out crappy software? Could be a case of resume driven development.
- freyr 6y agoI'd like to give the engineers and designers the benefit of the doubt, but there are better ways to do what they tried to do. Somewhere in the engineering hierarchy, some very poor decisions were made.
- gpmcadam 6y agoTry old.reddit.com
- szszrk 6y agoThat is true as well. I feel that espacially when I switch between computers - on some I have "old reddit" turned on and it works fine. On the new one I have no idea what's going on. Web interface transitions on sites we love are always harsh but I'm supposed to get used to new one by now. I can't.
- 3np 6y agopreferences: [ ] Autoplay Reddit videos on the desktop comments page [ ] allow subreddits to show me custom themes [x] show legacy search page [ ] Use new Reddit as my default experience similarly disable all under "personalization options" add umatrix rule for "USE THE NEW REDDIT" nag and then it's actually sane, at least for me in ff.
- Jnr 6y agoIn my opinion Reddit UX is miserable even on desktop. Whenever I see a Reddit link in search, I try to avoid it. It is in a way similar to Pinterest experience.
- noisy_boy 6y agoDoesn't matter. I was tired of "and my axe" type circlejerking anyway.
- BelleOfTheBall 6y agoThe Reddit experience overall is incredibly subpar. I can't remember the last time I opened the site without using the unofficial Reddit Is Fun app or the RES extension on desktop. They make the experience so much better and keep me wondering why Reddit doesn't implement some of the features provided in those extensions into the official version.
- jbb67 6y agoI still use reddit but less and less than I did, and the main reason for this is that the ui is getting worse and worse. I won't be installing the app as it's pointless. I probably won't choose to stop using it, but as I use it less and less the gap will eventually reach "forever".
- CarteBlanchett 6y agoThere's also https://voat.co https://voat.co, which is a reddit clone without the globohomo if that's more your thing. I find it much less hostile than reddit (I'm White).
- dmarchand90 6y agoI'm pretty hostile to that site since it's a major alt-right hub. A quick glance of today's headlines including hints at a Jewish global conspiracy and "women who don't have children go crazy"
- CarteBlanchett 6y agoAnd plenty of people are hostile to reddit because it's a major radical progressive propaganda hub. They feel the same disgust when they see what's popular on reddit. It's great that each they have a thriving community of their own now, and I was sharing it for anyone who shares or is open to that worldview or is generally pro free speech.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- FranzFerdiNaN 6y agoVoat is where people who were banned from reddit for being too racist, believing in and promoting insane conspiracies like pizzagate and QAnon, members of the incel commnunity and other such fun stuff went. Not sure its a place you want to promote.
- read_if_gay_ 6y agoI'm not really informed. Is Pizzagate not basically the Epstein story?
- badRNG 6y agoCW: Child abuse Pizzagate is a debunked alt-right conspiracy theory [1]. Epstein ran a child prostitution ring for himself and his inner circle [2]. Pizzagate conspiracy theorists have attempted to graft their theory onto the Epstein case in ways that are largely internally inconsistent. From what I can tell, it's been more successful in tethering itself to the Qanon movement. There have been many cases of the wealthy and powerful abusing children (Jared Fogle comes to mind,) but to connect it to Pizzagate really commits you to believe some pretty wild things (like the Clintons and celebs like Katy Perry are Satanists who ritualistically abuse children in service to Satan and do so out of a NY pizza joint called Comet Ping-Pong) [3]. (Famous guy + child abuse) != Pizzagate [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pizzagate_conspiracy_theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pizzagate_conspiracy_theory [2] https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/07/jeffrey-epstein-high-society-contacts.html https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/07/jeffrey-epstein-high... [3] https://www.rollingstone.com/feature/anatomy-of-a-fake-news-scandal-125877/ https://www.rollingstone.com/feature/anatomy-of-a-fake-news-...
- whywhywhywhy 6y agoMetrics driven design, if you hit your metrics even if the experience is objectively awful you're still rewarded as an employee. Thankfully this is the beginning of the end for most companies.
- TomGullen 6y agoI like the new Reddit. Originally I kept using the old style, but was semi forced onto the new design and now am used to it and quite like it.
- optimalsolver 6y agoYeah, I complained about the redesign at first, but now I can't go back to using old Reddit.
- kimjongtrill 6y agoI just use old.reddit.com. Yes my eyes hate me.
- kristopolous 6y agoI feel like once you are on mobile you only have access to this aberration of the internet called "The consumer web" where you're treated like a dawdling toddler who taps on shiny colorful things and the service is trying to put on a circus for you in order to get ad revenue. This is essentially the experience across the board on all major web properties. I have no idea why I use my cell phone to access websites so frequently. It's a really terrible experience. In fact, most of these sites are the candy and chips aisle for the mind - an unhealthy diet of emptiness. It's such a waste of time.
- m3kw9 6y agoI mean I have a 3rd party reddit app so it should bounce me to that app, but the UI pops up still it wants me to use their app only. So that’s a move that made me use it less.
- thinkloop 6y agoWhy exactly do they care whether you use the web or app?
- txsoftwaredev 6y agoMy guess would be they have more access and control of you on the app. They can prevent you from blocking ads, for example.
- cm2187 6y agoAm I right to assume that the reason developers prefer users to use apps vs websites is because there is no adblocker there and no way to flush cookies?
- searchableguy 6y agoYes, part of it. Web is more constrained environment than native. Many seemingly normal APIs and features aren't available. Apple is hostile to web as well so you don't even have features from the standards such as push notifications.
- adamzapasnik 6y agoReddit has become pretty terrible. I'm gonna call it, that's a perfect opportunity for other projects to arise and take Reddit's share of users and IMO it's gonna happen.
- pietrovismara 6y agoThe mobile web experience is so intentionally bad. Yet I refuse to switch to the app and play their game. When needed I request the desktop version mobile to fill the missing features and that's it.
- ShradhaSingh 6y agoAny subreddit suggestions for AI and ML?
- redwood 6y agoI really do find it infuriating. Some of us just hate mobile apps
- mianos 6y agoIt is ironic that reddit achieved much of its success on the back of the complete failure of digg.com to recognise that the people who use your site don't want a bunch of radical changes shoved down their throat. We will probably see the whole thing happen again. Long live the new king.
- pbhjpbhj 6y agoAIR: Slashdot redesigned, people moved to Digg, Digg redesigned, people moved to Reddit (was MySpace in there too?), Reddit ... let's redesign (actually they've partially reinvented themselves a couple of times to my recollection).
- esolyt 6y agoReddit has some of the most obnoxious and shameless dark patterns I've ever seen. Even if you download the app, it constantly tries to lure you into logging in by displaying a fake notification count. The good old "Hey you've got a message, login to see it" technique. If you still refuse to login, the notification count becomes 2, as if now you have 2 messages. It's quite disgusting and makes me dislike reddit. Unfortunately, I'm guessing these tactics work on the average user.
- searchableguy 6y agoThey all seem to be copied from Chinese apps though their implementations suck more. Virtual currency, awards, and gacha style encouragement is very popular in Asian countries for communication apps. That's how they extract value because there are too many competitors and free apps. Reddit might add shopping experience or real world items for purchase through coins soon. It's too obvious to not do that.
- mcintyre1994 6y agoThinking about it I'm a bit surprised that Reddit never built a marketplace product for subreddits. Looking back a few years I could see that actually being a pretty good product for them which would have been cool. You're definitely right that if they added it now it'd use their coins or do something utterly insane to make it terrible.
- ffpip 6y agoSubs are already selling merch. Look at r/teenagers mods selling cheap printed shirts.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- Bronze_Colossus 6y agoThey actually did have a store once upon time. And I can definitely see them bringing back to subreddits. [0] https://old.reddit.com/r/secretsanta/comments/2xdkyi/closing_the_redditgifts_marketplace/?sort=confidence https://old.reddit.com/r/secretsanta/comments/2xdkyi/closing...
- me551ah 6y agoReddit app on Android is one of the worst apps that I've ever used. 1. It doesn't refresh content. A lot of times you need to manually swipe down to force it to refresh,and sometimes even kill the app to get it to refresh. Even if Reddit is using cheaper http 1.1 servers , they can use background data notifications to force the app to do an update. 2. Videos randomly switch to the lowest quality and stay there. I have a 300mbps fiber connection which can play YouTube and Netflix on 4k. But Reddit gives me 240p at best sometimes. 3. Worst messaging experience period. Not only is the chat pretty bare bones, it doesn't even have support for images or GIFs. So usually once I find someone to chat with on Reddit , I ask for their discord id.
- nishanmiranda 6y agoI use Boost for REddit which is miles better than the original app
- jankiehodgpodge 6y agoBoost is a brilliant app, never use the desktop site because it's junk in comparison.
- SPBS 6y agoAm I crazy when I say I don't see these popups on the mobile web version of reddit anymore? I don't see what the fuss is about. It's pretty much the same as what the gif in TFA is showing, except no blinking 'use app'/'open in reddit app' buttons. No 'open in reddit app/continue with mobile site' popup -unless- I end up on the AMP version of the reddit (by following a link from Google search). And even then once I do anything on the AMP page (click on a reply, navigate to the main page) I get redirected away to the normal web version, which is less cancerous. Someone please back me up or refute me. Also I am logged in to the site, might make a difference.
- draw_down 6y agoTry logging out, or even better, try using reddit only in private/incognito.
- ppod 6y agoWhat are the best third party reddit apps?
- jpe-210 6y agoFrom my perspective there are only two ways to browse Reddit nowadays: visiting the old.reddit.com site and through a third-party mobile app. I’m not one to speak either about the changing dynamics on the site since it’s launch, but my experience there as a whole has shifted hard into the direction of carefully curated subreddits. Avoiding anything I don’t want to see is just as easy as never visiting All or Popular.
- dredmorbius 6y agoReddit is dead. Unfortunately, it's not turned into HN.
- rpod 6y agoAdding ".rss" to a subreddit's URL turns it into an RSS feed. I use this to avoid the homepage and ranking by hot/popular, and consume reddit like a normal news feed.
- isoprophlex 6y agoI use i.reddit.com on mobile, it seems distinct from old.reddit.com?
- cmeacham98 6y agoold.reddit serves you the old desktop interface, even on mobile. i.reddit serves you the very old mobile interface, even on desktop.
- livre 6y agoi.reddit.com serves the old mobile interface but the very old mobile interface is served at https://www.reddit.com/.mobile?keep_extension=True https://www.reddit.com/.mobile?keep_extension=True
- parliament32 6y agoI've been using this extensions for a few months now and it's great, auto-redirect all reddit URIs to the old site: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/old-reddit-redirect/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/old-reddit-re...
- jonathanleane 6y agoFor those sick of reddit, I offer the following link (with some unintended irony): https://www.reddit.com/r/RedditAlternatives/comments/cxb2xq/list_of_active_reddit_alternatives_40/ https://www.reddit.com/r/RedditAlternatives/comments/cxb2xq/... Also: https://ruqqus.com/ https://ruqqus.com/
- varispeed 6y agoReddit has become a Chinese information weapon spreading Marxism.
- gaudat 6y agoMy preferred way of consuming Reddit content is now finding a mirror of the sub on Telegram. [1] This greatly refined my experience by distilling the endless pun chain comments and dramas away. If, unfortunately, the OP content made me want to read the comments, I change the URL from https://reddit.com https://reddit.com to https://i.reddit.com https://i.reddit.com as soon as possible. Even though I clicked it 5 seconds too late, the new smartphone site is so slow that it was still a blank page. [1] Here's one of the more used bot with a long list of interesting subreddits. https://github.com/Fillll/reddit2telegram https://github.com/Fillll/reddit2telegram
- simias 6y agoI echo the complains about the default interface becoming worse with every update (especially on mobile, where it's borderline unusable) but I think it's interesting to see where this trend is headed. It seems obvious to me that Reddit is trying very hard to transition from link aggregator to full blown social network. It's pretty wild when you remember that the original reddit didn't even have comments! But now they self-host photos, videos, galleries, chatrooms, custom user pages etc... They're not a link aggregator anymore, they're trying to be Instagram for people who think they're too cool for Instagram. But if you want to become Instagram you need to be an app first and a website 2nd, so they're working very hard to kill the web. I sorta sort of look forward for the day they kill old.reddit.com and i.reddit.com, this way I won't have any excuse to browse the website anymore which will free some time for more interesting things.
- FriendlyNormie 6y agoWho gives a fuck? How is this news? My app has over 100 million Play Store downloads and I’m just one person.
- ricardobeat 6y agoWhy has the title been editorialized? The "mostly by making the mobile web experience miserable" part is the focus of this report (and true).
- alborzb 6y agoIt wasn't by me! Maybe it's over a character limit for titles? Maybe done by mods.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- leetrout 6y agoYes. Tons of titles are changed all the time. https://hackernewstitles.netlify.app/ https://hackernewstitles.netlify.app/
- dvtrn 6y agoI understand mods edit titles and have said so to “de-editorialize/sensationalize” them but I’m seeing a lot of purely style changes; capitalization removal. Some are changes entirely from perfectly fine and comprehensible titles that aren’t even sensationalized headlines Others still add or remove a word that don’t really do anything for the title except change the inflection slightly to one the author may not even want perceived from their writing. Whom does that sort of edit serve? Merely curious.
- aspenmayer 6y agoIt serves the will of HN according to justifications I’ve seen. It’s debatable if it is always is helpful in any individual instance, but it’s usually well-intentioned from what I can tell. Yet it also seems to turn the volume down on topics that are of outsize influence or import on society, to my reading. It second-guesses the intent of the author, and second-guesses the reading comprehension of the reader. It treats us all like clickbait vote bots.
- ragnese 6y agoI genuinely wonder if the people in charge of Reddit ever come around to places like this to read these sentiments. Hell, they actually only need to read actual Reddit posts to understand that many people are utterly disgusted by their tactics to try and force you onto their mobile app, they're upset at how slow the (default) site is, etc. Maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe people will keep using it forever. But I doubt it. They've turned Reddit from something that had potential to exist for a long time into something closer to TikTok (which, even without the current drama, was never going to be more than a fad IMO). There are more efficient ways to get low-effort shitposts and memes than Reddit. Those who want that will move on, and the people who were interested in more than that are leaving now.
- edoceo 6y agoWhere are they going?
- ragnese 6y agoThe people who want more non-meme content? I'm not sure. I'm not saying they've all moved on yet, but I bet they will. For example, I preferred some of the more tech-related subreddits. Then I discovered HackerNews and Lobste.rs. That can't be the only demographic of content that has forums out there. And I imagine more will pop up. Again, it's just my prediction/guess. I've certainly been wrong before. Perhaps I have it totally backwards. Maybe those people will stay because they're more tolerant of Reddit's bullshit to get to the good content. I don't think that's a smart bet for Reddit to make, though. EDIT: Also, a lot of people are apparently moving to Discord chats.
- edoceo 6y agoMy anecdata: I'm a long time reddit user, hate their new UI/UX, avoid their App and now visit less. I'm also still looking for what's next. Im thinking to go back to finding good RSS. Where is a good feed finder?
- 6y ago
- thrownaway954 6y agothat's cause they push it like a crack dealer pushing crack. wanna play a video, open it in the app. wanna look at risky content, open it in the app. and btw, their app IS THE WORST. my biggest gripe is that i CANNOT COLLAPSE CONVERSATIONS grrrrrrrrrrrrr. i'm not gonna waste my time listing all the other annoyances and bugs that are riddled through out the thing. fact of the matter is that the reddit app is the poster child that just because something has that many downloads doesn't mean it's a good product. i would be willing to bet that 75% of those download are people uninstall and reinstalling it because it LOCKS UP EVERY 5 MINUTES grrrrrrrrrrrr.
- flatline 6y agoYou can collapse conversations by clicking the small blank space to the right of a user’s name at the top of the comment. Bad UI but it’s there.
- thrownaway954 6y agobeen trying that on the app and it doesn't work. works on the site but not the app.
- pluc 6y agoThat app is the worst. As a mod, I need mod features. The official app doesn't have enough mod features to be useful. Reminder: every mod works for reddit for free.
- gkilmain 6y agoHow much time do you spend being a mod / working for free? Genuinely curious.
- pluc 6y agoSorry didn't see this. I don't really see it as time spent being a mod, it's time spent "being on reddit". Instead of just looking at the latest posts, I get to act on the ones that break the rules. When reading comments, I do the same with comments. It's just a parallel cycle to consuming it, I think. And we're talking of one click to remove things here, not a complicated workflow.
- cybdnb 6y agoReddit was never good
- 14 6y agoI haven’t used the Facebook app either and now they are going out of their way to make the mobile experience miserable. Facebook now looks like reddit and the marketplace is now pushing unblock able ads mixed in with the listings. Also marketplace took away the ability to sort items from lowest price to highest so you have to search through many listings to find what you want. The experience is worse every day.
- gadders 6y agoI see the title has been re-written. Got to protect that YC investment.
- dghughes 6y agoI don't like the new reddit I always use old.reddit and I see no reason to use the app. I hate now that all link load in new reddit. It's a hundred cuts of annoyance. As a longtime user (13 years) I get the feeling reddit is being Digg-ified.
- nirav72 6y agoThere are many better third-party reddit apps out there than the official reddit app. Although seems like Android has more options than on the IOS side. Apollo is the only one I found so far on IOS that is fairly decent and feature rich matching the ones on android. Any other recommendations?
- crazygringo 6y agoAm I the only one who thinks it's fine? Let's be real: the performance of Reddit's mobile app is quite good. And when I compare it to any other similar mobile site feed, the sites are always slow and janky, because browsers aren't great with handling infinite scrolling full of hundreds of videos and tens of thousands of nested comments. I know everybody here think's it's a "dark pattern" to get people to use Reddit's app instead of site on mobile... but to me it looks like it could also be legitimate performance concerns.
- grumple 6y agoThe site renders text and embedded images/video. That’s not something that demands high performance. They require the app purely so they can track you better and make more revenue from you. It’s much harder to run Adblock in an app.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- jjice 6y agoI'm using a Moto X4, so it is a few years old, but the official Reddit app runs terribly on my phone. Reddit Is Fun (RIF) is my preferred app since it doesn't try anything fancy and my phone handles it great. To be fair, Reddit's mobile app looks very good and modern, but for a news feed, I'll take outdated design and speed over the opposite.
- Volt 6y agoBut the performance doesn't have to be bad. If infinite scrolling is a problem, then either don't do it, or use a better implementation.
- AstroJetson 6y agoI'm not happy with it. I was reading reddit on my iPad in safari which worked really well. I could open linked articles in a new tab and go from there. About three weeks ago they made a site upgrade that broke that. Was reading via old.reddit.com but that became way too painful. Currently using Apollo, it will let me open linked to articles, but I can't grab a link, paste it, scrape all the URL tracking nonsense off and go to the site.
- dimillian 6y agoNative app are better than mobile web for complexe application / website. Get over it.
- pappyapp 6y agoSir, Your site is very good, this is my site of image and poetry which I want Do-follow backlinks from your site. Please help me. .. <a href="https://www.allthebestimage.com/"> https://www.allthebestimage.com/"> All The Best Image </a> <a href="https://www.wishbeautifulallimageshayari.com/"> https://www.wishbeautifulallimageshayari.com/"> All Image Shayari </a>
- ashtonkem 6y agoI’ve stopped using Reddit. The inability for the web interface to actually play videos reliably was a deal breaker in retrospect.
- a1exus 6y agoReddit app stopped working for me long time ago, I wrote to devs, but no luck (
- SXX 6y agoRedReader is much better experience though.
- racl101 6y agoYeah, by making the browser experience awful. No thanks. I'm weary of installing apps for things I should simply be able to view a browser. I learned my lesson with Facebook and all the shady things it does.
- joelthelion 6y agoMaybe users could retaliate by giving the app horrible ratings?
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- valuearb 6y agoProof Google Play doesn’t check for malware.
- t0mmyb0y 6y agoAntitrust anyone?
- mrjeremyt 6y agoI think it's funny how on iOS (at least for me) whenever I come across a reddit link it'll ask me whether I want to continue to view in whatever webView it's using or switch to the app. I usually prefer the app, so I click on it and 9 times out of 10 it'll take me to the app store for the default reddit app WHICH I ALREADY HAVE INSTALLED AND REGULARLY USE and it won't open in the app no mater what I try. Like this should be pretty basic functionality, especially if they're trying to drive users to their app, but nope.
- acchow 6y agoBroken experience. Does this happen when the version you have installed is not the latest one?
- slow_donkey 6y agoIdk if this is necessarily Reddits fault because we've had tons of problems implementing universal links on iOS both via 3rd party and natively ourselves so I lean towards blaming the ios platform than the developer.
- anonzzz 6y agoI like reddit for the niche groups that center around some topic. I haven't really found another source of this type of niche content. Maybe Facebook has groups or whatever but I have never used Facebook so can't comment. On Android, I like Redreader which, to my mind, is simple, open and free. It was the my first experience using a mobile Reddit app and I really thought it stayed out of the way and let me read and comment in various reddits. I started using an iPhone and decided to give the official reddit app a whirl. This app is clunky and confusing and doesn't feel simple in any way. I have tried a few other apps (everyone seems to like Apollo?) but I haven't really found my home yet. I still really appreciate RedReader for its simple uncluttered ability to read and comment. In the browser, I like using old.reddit.com. Their default version of the site is horrible. I can't stand it. On a computer, my preferred way of browsing reddit is using ttrv. It is the latest incarnation of rtv. It is command line, which might turn some people off, but is simple and easy to setup. I use feh to view pictures and mpv to view videos. I can comment using vim which makes it very cozy. I guess it is good that reddit provides an api that allows hackers to develop alternative ways to access their site depending on their own personal preference. For now, their mobile official app seems to comprimise in too many areas to make it work for me. The new site (not the old.reddit.com) is pain to use.
- LordAtlas 6y agoSometimes I wonder what the Reddit dev team even does. Their search is crap, their app is crap, their new design is crap, their home page algorithm is crap that keeps showing stale content, their video player is utter crap that shows you 144p videos even on 100 Mbps connections. It's like they stopped giving a shit a long time ago. (I use Reddit for 2-3 hours every day, despite all that. But of course I use RES and the RIF app, and stay away from politics subs. There's a lot of interesting communities that I learn from.)
- 50ckpuppet 6y agowhat's reddit ?
- crakhamster01 6y agoI actually like the Reddit app, but its search engine is so awful that I almost always start on Google/DDG and refine my results through there. If they could improve their search experience I would be all in on the app.