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Reddit today is the opposite of what it was in the beginning. Unsurprising that they’d write out Swartz in their quest to be a friendly corporate face. Alas, a

Reddit today is the opposite of what it was in the beginning. Unsurprising that they’d write out Swartz in their quest to be a friendly corporate face. Alas, a new competitor will replace it soon. Virtually no one has brand loyalty to Reddit and their audience is becoming narrower and narrower.

mantap 6y ago
Considering that Reddit's own popularity was boosted by Digg's collapse due to unpopular changes and dysfunction, you'd think that Reddit would be more aware of the risks of pursuing an antagonistic relationship with their users.
- Krasnol 6y ago
  But their success proves that they don't have to care... I mean seriously this "Diggs past will come for you"-line is being repeated for years but it's not happening. Meanwhile "alternatives" come up and and become irrelevant or nests of hate.
  - tinus_hn 6y ago
    That’s true, just until when it’s no longer true. Just like Digg, MySpace and many networks before them.
    - ratww 6y ago
      The problem is that such an open-ended prediction has absolutely no value whatsoever... I'm sure Reddit will die someday, but people have been saying this for at least 10 years or more. When non-technical users started using it, when violentacrez et al were banned, with every layout change big or small, staff changes... People said the same thing about Facebook when it opened to non-edu users or when it launched the timeline. Or when Apple is antagonistic towards developers. Reddit, Facebook, Apple and other companies are able to do well by antagonizing niche users because niche users can be replaced by regular folk. And sometimes it's almost necessary to antagonize those early users, since they can be a barrier to growth. Reddit wants to dissociate themselves from 4chan, t_d, Boston Bomber and all this stuff. And they're doing it via cat pictures and the sort.
      - tinus_hn 6y ago
        The value is in knowing they always have to watch their toes because it can all be over in a heartbeat. There is a very fine line between domination and irrelevance.
        ratww 6y ago
        Digg, MySpace and Friendster weren't "over in a heartbeat". It took decay and lack of care with the platform, plus strong competition with strong venture capital funding. Plus, they were never as dominant or as entrenched as Reddit is. Reddit is not going away just because you dislike it.
        tinus_hn 6y ago
        I was never on MySpace and Friendster but Digg was over in a heartbeat with the introduction of their redesign. And I don’t care about Reddit one way or the other, it kind of stinks but it’ll ultimately be replaced by something else that also stinks.
        mantap 6y ago
        As I remember it, what happened on Digg was that there was a kind of friendly rivalry between Reddit and Digg. So everybody on Digg was already aware of Reddit. Then when the redesign hit, a meme spread that "This redesign sucks, try reddit". And so people did. And what they found was a much better community (Digg was more like a news website with a comment section). The cautionary tail for Reddit is that what keeps people locked into a social network is community. And if they replace community with cat pictures, the whole thing will fall apart.
        ratww 6y ago
        Yep. Also, what Digg did wasn't just a redesign, but also a complete rewrite from scratch in the exact way Joel Spolsky told everyone not to do one decade before [1]. It was buggy and missing important community features, and it was incompatible with the old website because they had changed the whole database too, so there was no way of choosing between old and new running side by side like you can with Reddit. [1] https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-...
    - Krasnol 6y ago
      Those networks had all strong alternatives. I see none for reddit atm.
  - mansion7 6y ago
    Reddit is very much a nest of hate, if you are any stripe of conservative. "The Donald" was censored, then banned, for speech less heinous, in lesser amounts, and with lower, or often negative, voting scores, than is currently allowed on the site now (by those with approved political beliefs, of course). Those with non-approved beliefs find themselves silenced and censored by moderators and admins, while those who instigated their silencing are left unmolested. Subreddits with thousands (or in the case of "The Donald", HUNDREDS of thousands) of members are banned for the actions of a very, very few. In some such cases, those few were outside instigators (Reddit calls them "brigaders") from subreddits with opposing views; purposefully posting inflammatory material under sockpuppet accounts. The "brigaders" then report the naughty speech to the admins. Doesn't take many such reports to have all those thousands of voices silenced. Of course this tends to go one way. Although "brigading" is ostensibly against Reddit rules, subreddits with approved views are allowed to do it openly, although some do in private. And lest we forget, the CEO of Reddit HIMSELF has hacked into user accounts of those with unapproved views, and posted inflammatory things posing AS them (an act which Redditors were assured was not possible). Supposedly he's only done it a few times, but how are Redditors to know for sure? When all these activities on the part of Reddit's leadership go one way, and are directed specifically against one political persuasion, it becomes very clear that Reddit IS a nest of hate, and that's the way they like it. It is also clear that they censor not to stop "hate" but to cease the discussion and meme production of conservatives, to which they partially attribute Trump's 2016 victory. To this end, they've recently gone so far as to announce that they will censure users for merely VOTING on unapproved topics. Sure, they say those unapproved topics are "hate", but when the people defining "hate" are so slimy as to hack into and pose as their own users to sow discord, or to tacitly approve one way "brigades", one need not wonder their actual purposes. Like so many of their brethren in the media who took it personally when Hillary lost, they are taking drastic action to be sure that such free speech activities not continue if there is any possibility of a repeat of 2016.
    - dontcarethrow2 6y ago
      This is too accurate. Thought control in its simplicity. Ban all dissenting opinions, create a bunch of hacked up minions.
ChrisKnott 6y ago
Do you have a source for "their audience is becoming narrower and narrower"?
- f69281c 6y ago
  I think they meant ideologically
blueboo 6y ago
I think this is wishful thinking. Reddit at its inception was sock puppet-boosted discussion of atheism and coding. Every choice its leaders have been made have been in support of further growth, not some philosophical ideal. It’s now one of the most vibrant discussion forums on the internet. It’s been growing faster than it can manage, but that’s been the case for years. Hostage to a brittle moderation model that doesn’t scale, certain discussions can’t be safely or productively had at its scale. It’s a practical reality...in support of further growth. For every open internet advocate that abandons it in disgust, another dozen grandmas and teens register and download the app. Whatever the case, I do hope you’re right and a competitor finds a way to do this better.
- datalus 6y ago
  Do you have any sources to back this up? Particulary the hordes of grandmothers & teens downloading the app in record numbers?
ratww 6y ago
I don't think so. If anything, Reddit is getting bigger. In my circle nobody knew what it was five years ago. Now it has effectively become mainstream, and is being (positively) quoted on TV, etc. This is actually the second time it happens. Ten years ago people also claimed that "Reddit is dying". It wasn't, it was just changing its core audience of technical users to a broader one. And now it is doing it again.
- ceilingcorner 6y ago
  Mainstream name recognition isn’t particularly indicative of success. In my experience, Reddit is slowly eliminating anything that doesn’t conform to a west coast American view of the world. Unfortunately for them, the rest of the world is coming online and has a different view of things. We’re starting to see this with India and the EU. Best case scenario for Reddit is a link aggregator for a very narrow group, unless they turn off the hyper-partisan path and return to their roots.
  - throwaway_gdc 6y ago
    >Unfortunately for them, the rest of the world is coming online and has a different view of things. We’re starting to see this with India and the EU. Reddit moderation is especially going to clash with many Europeans view on immigration from Islamic countries.
    - ratww 6y ago
      I have no idea what you're implying by that, but do you know what else clashes with "Europeans view on immigration from Islamic countries"? Views from other Europeans. We're not an homogenic bunch as you think.
      - throwaway_gdc 6y ago
        I am not talking about raging far-right people. I meant the swing to the right among the general population and politicians. https://www.thelocal.se/20200118/swedish-pm-calls-for-dramatic-reduction-in-refugee-number https://www.thelocal.se/20200118/swedish-pm-calls-for-dramat... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9A1LtmxkAYk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9A1LtmxkAYk
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
noelsusman 6y ago
Meanwhile in reality Reddit had 430 million active monthly users last year, 30% more than Twitter.
- ceilingcorner 6y ago
  Does anyone actually believe these numbers? Reddit seems half filled with bots and alt accounts to me.
  - thiht 6y ago
    As an avid reddit user, wtf? That's not my feeling at all. What subreddits do you use?
    - ceilingcorner 6y ago
      I read many subreddits. It’s my strong impression that most of the mainstream subs (which make up a vast majority of the userbase) are filled with questionable accounts.
  - anothermoron 6y ago
    Twitter as well.
  - leephillips 6y ago
    If I recall correctly, its initial user base was mostly composed of fake users, to make it appear as if had quickly become popular.

mantap 6y ago

Considering that Reddit's own popularity was boosted by Digg's collapse due to unpopular changes and dysfunction, you'd think that Reddit would be more aware of the risks of pursuing an antagonistic relationship with their users.

Krasnol 6y ago
But their success proves that they don't have to care... I mean seriously this "Diggs past will come for you"-line is being repeated for years but it's not happening. Meanwhile "alternatives" come up and and become irrelevant or nests of hate.
- tinus_hn 6y ago
  That’s true, just until when it’s no longer true. Just like Digg, MySpace and many networks before them.
  - ratww 6y ago
    The problem is that such an open-ended prediction has absolutely no value whatsoever... I'm sure Reddit will die someday, but people have been saying this for at least 10 years or more. When non-technical users started using it, when violentacrez et al were banned, with every layout change big or small, staff changes... People said the same thing about Facebook when it opened to non-edu users or when it launched the timeline. Or when Apple is antagonistic towards developers. Reddit, Facebook, Apple and other companies are able to do well by antagonizing niche users because niche users can be replaced by regular folk. And sometimes it's almost necessary to antagonize those early users, since they can be a barrier to growth. Reddit wants to dissociate themselves from 4chan, t_d, Boston Bomber and all this stuff. And they're doing it via cat pictures and the sort.
    - tinus_hn 6y ago
      The value is in knowing they always have to watch their toes because it can all be over in a heartbeat. There is a very fine line between domination and irrelevance.
      - ratww 6y ago
        Digg, MySpace and Friendster weren't "over in a heartbeat". It took decay and lack of care with the platform, plus strong competition with strong venture capital funding. Plus, they were never as dominant or as entrenched as Reddit is. Reddit is not going away just because you dislike it.
        tinus_hn 6y ago
        I was never on MySpace and Friendster but Digg was over in a heartbeat with the introduction of their redesign. And I don’t care about Reddit one way or the other, it kind of stinks but it’ll ultimately be replaced by something else that also stinks.
        mantap 6y ago
        As I remember it, what happened on Digg was that there was a kind of friendly rivalry between Reddit and Digg. So everybody on Digg was already aware of Reddit. Then when the redesign hit, a meme spread that "This redesign sucks, try reddit". And so people did. And what they found was a much better community (Digg was more like a news website with a comment section). The cautionary tail for Reddit is that what keeps people locked into a social network is community. And if they replace community with cat pictures, the whole thing will fall apart.
        ratww 6y ago
        Yep. Also, what Digg did wasn't just a redesign, but also a complete rewrite from scratch in the exact way Joel Spolsky told everyone not to do one decade before [1]. It was buggy and missing important community features, and it was incompatible with the old website because they had changed the whole database too, so there was no way of choosing between old and new running side by side like you can with Reddit. [1] https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-...
  - Krasnol 6y ago
    Those networks had all strong alternatives. I see none for reddit atm.
- mansion7 6y ago
  Reddit is very much a nest of hate, if you are any stripe of conservative. "The Donald" was censored, then banned, for speech less heinous, in lesser amounts, and with lower, or often negative, voting scores, than is currently allowed on the site now (by those with approved political beliefs, of course). Those with non-approved beliefs find themselves silenced and censored by moderators and admins, while those who instigated their silencing are left unmolested. Subreddits with thousands (or in the case of "The Donald", HUNDREDS of thousands) of members are banned for the actions of a very, very few. In some such cases, those few were outside instigators (Reddit calls them "brigaders") from subreddits with opposing views; purposefully posting inflammatory material under sockpuppet accounts. The "brigaders" then report the naughty speech to the admins. Doesn't take many such reports to have all those thousands of voices silenced. Of course this tends to go one way. Although "brigading" is ostensibly against Reddit rules, subreddits with approved views are allowed to do it openly, although some do in private. And lest we forget, the CEO of Reddit HIMSELF has hacked into user accounts of those with unapproved views, and posted inflammatory things posing AS them (an act which Redditors were assured was not possible). Supposedly he's only done it a few times, but how are Redditors to know for sure? When all these activities on the part of Reddit's leadership go one way, and are directed specifically against one political persuasion, it becomes very clear that Reddit IS a nest of hate, and that's the way they like it. It is also clear that they censor not to stop "hate" but to cease the discussion and meme production of conservatives, to which they partially attribute Trump's 2016 victory. To this end, they've recently gone so far as to announce that they will censure users for merely VOTING on unapproved topics. Sure, they say those unapproved topics are "hate", but when the people defining "hate" are so slimy as to hack into and pose as their own users to sow discord, or to tacitly approve one way "brigades", one need not wonder their actual purposes. Like so many of their brethren in the media who took it personally when Hillary lost, they are taking drastic action to be sure that such free speech activities not continue if there is any possibility of a repeat of 2016.
  - dontcarethrow2 6y ago
    This is too accurate. Thought control in its simplicity. Ban all dissenting opinions, create a bunch of hacked up minions.

ChrisKnott 6y ago

Do you have a source for "their audience is becoming narrower and narrower"?

f69281c 6y ago
I think they meant ideologically

blueboo 6y ago

I think this is wishful thinking. Reddit at its inception was sock puppet-boosted discussion of atheism and coding. Every choice its leaders have been made have been in support of further growth, not some philosophical ideal. It’s now one of the most vibrant discussion forums on the internet. It’s been growing faster than it can manage, but that’s been the case for years. Hostage to a brittle moderation model that doesn’t scale, certain discussions can’t be safely or productively had at its scale. It’s a practical reality...in support of further growth. For every open internet advocate that abandons it in disgust, another dozen grandmas and teens register and download the app. Whatever the case, I do hope you’re right and a competitor finds a way to do this better.

datalus 6y ago
Do you have any sources to back this up? Particulary the hordes of grandmothers & teens downloading the app in record numbers?

ratww 6y ago

I don't think so. If anything, Reddit is getting bigger. In my circle nobody knew what it was five years ago. Now it has effectively become mainstream, and is being (positively) quoted on TV, etc. This is actually the second time it happens. Ten years ago people also claimed that "Reddit is dying". It wasn't, it was just changing its core audience of technical users to a broader one. And now it is doing it again.

ceilingcorner 6y ago
Mainstream name recognition isn’t particularly indicative of success. In my experience, Reddit is slowly eliminating anything that doesn’t conform to a west coast American view of the world. Unfortunately for them, the rest of the world is coming online and has a different view of things. We’re starting to see this with India and the EU. Best case scenario for Reddit is a link aggregator for a very narrow group, unless they turn off the hyper-partisan path and return to their roots.
- throwaway_gdc 6y ago
  >Unfortunately for them, the rest of the world is coming online and has a different view of things. We’re starting to see this with India and the EU. Reddit moderation is especially going to clash with many Europeans view on immigration from Islamic countries.
  - ratww 6y ago
    I have no idea what you're implying by that, but do you know what else clashes with "Europeans view on immigration from Islamic countries"? Views from other Europeans. We're not an homogenic bunch as you think.
    - throwaway_gdc 6y ago
      I am not talking about raging far-right people. I meant the swing to the right among the general population and politicians. https://www.thelocal.se/20200118/swedish-pm-calls-for-dramatic-reduction-in-refugee-number https://www.thelocal.se/20200118/swedish-pm-calls-for-dramat... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9A1LtmxkAYk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9A1LtmxkAYk

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

noelsusman 6y ago

Meanwhile in reality Reddit had 430 million active monthly users last year, 30% more than Twitter.

ceilingcorner 6y ago
Does anyone actually believe these numbers? Reddit seems half filled with bots and alt accounts to me.
- thiht 6y ago
  As an avid reddit user, wtf? That's not my feeling at all. What subreddits do you use?
  - ceilingcorner 6y ago
    I read many subreddits. It’s my strong impression that most of the mainstream subs (which make up a vast majority of the userbase) are filled with questionable accounts.
- anothermoron 6y ago
  Twitter as well.
- leephillips 6y ago
  If I recall correctly, its initial user base was mostly composed of fake users, to make it appear as if had quickly become popular.