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My Reddit usage has basically plummeted to 0 at this point because of their pushing me towards an app. I think there are provable cases where an app almost cer

My Reddit usage has basically plummeted to 0 at this point because of their pushing me towards an app. I think there are provable cases where an app almost certainly leads to less retention than more and something like Reddit, whose value lies in allowing you to explore the internet is almost certainly one of them.

thejosh 4y ago
Best thing reddit did to break my use of them: 1/ New UI, forcing people on to old.reddit.com 2/ Mobile pushes HARD for their app, which is pretty buggy on Android from what I can tell 3/ old.reddit.com now shows "other links" midway down the page! Absolutely useless. 4/ old.reddit.com now forces "show more comments" This is why people left digg to go to reddit. :-) All I want is the old reddit interface in the middle, feel free to place ads on the right. I even went reddit gold or whatever it was called for a while. I really miss the old reddit UI, there is so much good tech information on reddit for random things, that it's a shame.
manigandham 4y ago
Reddit optimizes for user attention to sell ads. The mobile app is better at delivering that attention across the user base, even if a few users don't like it. Same thing with Quora and many others.
Lucasoato 4y ago
I really can't understand why Reddit is pushing the app so hard. I mean, keep that as an option, but why creating an awful UX for the mobile web users? You gather more data but the product is worse, less users are staying and you're losing value at the end...
- usrn 4y ago
  Push notifications. Once someone is hooked on the site a notification can get them back into the dopamine feedback loop very easily. I think this is why restaurant chains have started giving people free food to install their apps too (along with all the data they can sell now.) I think smartphones would be much less popular if people understood why corporations love "apps" so much. It's nothing like the older PC world full of software more or less for its own sake.
  - sva_ 4y ago
    > Push notifications. Do people not turn these off? When I get an unwanted notification, I immediately withdraw permissions to send notifications, or even uninstall the app
    - OtmaneBenazzou 4y ago
      bold of you to assume that the average user knows how to disable anything on their phone
      - sva_ 4y ago
        I suppose you need to have some idea of how the system is structured to even consider turning certain "features" off.
      - doliveira 4y ago
        Kind of scary to imagine the experience of such an average user. "Evil" is not a bad word to describe the attitudes of such apps and services.
    - pixl97 4y ago
      If your on HN you're already in a very filtered group that is less likely to be passive on abusive technology.
- saagarjha 4y ago
  Increased engagement and better tracking.
- propogandist 4y ago
  You drive high ad revenue with their mobile app, with all the data mining. The old reddit experience was destroyed to drive ad revenue, they don’t care about UX. also, beware of reddit URLs bouncing through out.reddit.com — which tracks all link clicks on reddit across mobile and desktop (profiling interests), regardless of login state
- dawnerd 4y ago
  Easy, harder for users to block the ads in apps. Apple / Google should allow add blockers for the entire OS.
  - pixl97 4y ago
    Heh, Google adding ad blockers.... I think you might be on the wrong timeline.
  - vorpalhex 4y ago
    Pihole works well here but obviously not end user friendly.
  - jawline 4y ago
    It is possible with SNI blocking to adblock on Android, even when apps use custom DNS revolvers (though not as effective). I built https://github.com/jawline/Puffer https://github.com/jawline/Puffer a while ago but haven't had the time to improve it much past proof of concept.
  - nyolfen 4y ago
    i use this on ios: https://apps.apple.com/app/apple-store/id691121579?pt=425087&ct=in-app-share&mt=8 https://apps.apple.com/app/apple-store/id691121579?pt=425087... it’s a vpn profile that just intercepts dns requests locally and screens with a hosts file
- Zambyte 4y ago
  > You gather more data That's it. That's the whole story. Mobile apps provide more opportunity to spy on the user.
- kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
  Series F funding. They don't know how to run lean and make themselves profitable so they run a grift on investors and sweet talk them with stories about high value data collection.
bragh 4y ago
If reddit ever gets rid of old.reddit.com, that is the day that I stop using it.
- sva_ 4y ago
  I think a lot of mods use it, and that's why they don't get rid of it - since reddit mods basically work for Reddit for free.
andrepd 4y ago
I'm still shook that the i.reddit.com interface still works and is virtually unchanged for over 10 years now! If only more companies followed that principle and just left the bloody interfaces alone unless that had a very good reason.
KronisLV 4y ago
> My Reddit usage has basically plummeted to 0 at this point because of their pushing me towards an app. My phone can't even work all that well with apps like that or Chrome browser/WebView for that matter. I use Opera on my phone because they allow me to have 50-100 tabs open with no issues, but maybe that's only passable because I never do anything important like banking on the phone anyways. So, whenever I'm coerced into installing an app for actually browsing content, reading comments, looking at media (vs something more one-off like ordering food/a ride), I just look the other way. Ergo, I never use Reddit on my phone without spoofing the user agent or whatever the "request desktop site" option in Opera does, but then the UI becomes unusable on a phone. Sadly, cases like mine don't show up in any metrics, nor do people care about that use case, so it's likely that this will keep being done a lot.
- f1refly 4y ago
  You can also use i.reddit.com or old.reddit.com, they're both mich better than the regular site and i.reddit.com is adapted to mobile.
laurencei 4y ago
Check out the "Apollo" reddit app. Its a 3rd party app for Reddit. I've started using it and would never go back to the native Reddit app. No ads, very fast, constant updates etc.
- solarkraft 4y ago
  I wish I knew why they're pushing the app so hard so I can specifically avoid doing that. If they want you to just have any app installed they'd win even if you install Apollo.
  - 3np 4y ago
    If you don't require authenticated functionality: https://r.nf/ https://r.nf/ https://github.com/spikecodes/libreddit https://github.com/spikecodes/libreddit https://codeberg.org/teddit/teddit https://codeberg.org/teddit/teddit
  - joshstrange 4y ago
    > If they want you to just have any app installed they'd win even if you install Apollo. Sorry but this just isn't true. They want the app for the tracking, push notifications, etc. Apollo doesn't have the tracking and does it's own push notifications (so you don't get Reddit's marketing-type notifications). Also it's much harder, if not impossible, to block ads in an app vs the web. Apollo has zero ads, they absolutely don't want you using it, even the web is better for Reddit. It's only a matter of time before they "Twitter" up their API even more than they already do. There are multiple things (stats, polls, certain profile features) that they don't expose through their API.
    - moneywoes 4y ago
      Does Apollo use their official apis won’t they just deprecate those like Twitter did?
      - joshstrange 4y ago
        Yep, that’s why I said this: > It's only a matter of time before they "Twitter" up their API even more than they already do. When that happens I imagine I’ll fall off of Reddit. “old.reddit.com” and Apollo are the only reasons it’s bearable to use other than a Google search destination. There is and will be for years if not decades a ton of important/useful information on reddit. Things like cooking tips, home server building, relatively unbiased product reviews, video game help, and the list goes on. A good portion of that content is evergreen. But as for participating, I won’t go back to the official app after using Apollo, even if that means leaving Reddit after over a decade.
maneesh 4y ago
I agree that Reddit pushes too hard to get people to use the mobile app. I found a good trick was to use AN app, just not their app. Apollo on iOS and Boost on android are really good alternatives to the official Reddit app, which is littered with ads.

thejosh 4y ago

Best thing reddit did to break my use of them: 1/ New UI, forcing people on to old.reddit.com 2/ Mobile pushes HARD for their app, which is pretty buggy on Android from what I can tell 3/ old.reddit.com now shows "other links" midway down the page! Absolutely useless. 4/ old.reddit.com now forces "show more comments" This is why people left digg to go to reddit. :-) All I want is the old reddit interface in the middle, feel free to place ads on the right. I even went reddit gold or whatever it was called for a while. I really miss the old reddit UI, there is so much good tech information on reddit for random things, that it's a shame.

manigandham 4y ago

Reddit optimizes for user attention to sell ads. The mobile app is better at delivering that attention across the user base, even if a few users don't like it. Same thing with Quora and many others.

Lucasoato 4y ago

I really can't understand why Reddit is pushing the app so hard. I mean, keep that as an option, but why creating an awful UX for the mobile web users? You gather more data but the product is worse, less users are staying and you're losing value at the end...

usrn 4y ago
Push notifications. Once someone is hooked on the site a notification can get them back into the dopamine feedback loop very easily. I think this is why restaurant chains have started giving people free food to install their apps too (along with all the data they can sell now.) I think smartphones would be much less popular if people understood why corporations love "apps" so much. It's nothing like the older PC world full of software more or less for its own sake.
- sva_ 4y ago
  > Push notifications. Do people not turn these off? When I get an unwanted notification, I immediately withdraw permissions to send notifications, or even uninstall the app
  - OtmaneBenazzou 4y ago
    bold of you to assume that the average user knows how to disable anything on their phone
    - sva_ 4y ago
      I suppose you need to have some idea of how the system is structured to even consider turning certain "features" off.
    - doliveira 4y ago
      Kind of scary to imagine the experience of such an average user. "Evil" is not a bad word to describe the attitudes of such apps and services.
  - pixl97 4y ago
    If your on HN you're already in a very filtered group that is less likely to be passive on abusive technology.
saagarjha 4y ago
Increased engagement and better tracking.
propogandist 4y ago
You drive high ad revenue with their mobile app, with all the data mining. The old reddit experience was destroyed to drive ad revenue, they don’t care about UX. also, beware of reddit URLs bouncing through out.reddit.com — which tracks all link clicks on reddit across mobile and desktop (profiling interests), regardless of login state
dawnerd 4y ago
Easy, harder for users to block the ads in apps. Apple / Google should allow add blockers for the entire OS.
- pixl97 4y ago
  Heh, Google adding ad blockers.... I think you might be on the wrong timeline.
- vorpalhex 4y ago
  Pihole works well here but obviously not end user friendly.
- jawline 4y ago
  It is possible with SNI blocking to adblock on Android, even when apps use custom DNS revolvers (though not as effective). I built https://github.com/jawline/Puffer https://github.com/jawline/Puffer a while ago but haven't had the time to improve it much past proof of concept.
- nyolfen 4y ago
  i use this on ios: https://apps.apple.com/app/apple-store/id691121579?pt=425087&ct=in-app-share&mt=8 https://apps.apple.com/app/apple-store/id691121579?pt=425087... it’s a vpn profile that just intercepts dns requests locally and screens with a hosts file
Zambyte 4y ago
> You gather more data That's it. That's the whole story. Mobile apps provide more opportunity to spy on the user.
kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
Series F funding. They don't know how to run lean and make themselves profitable so they run a grift on investors and sweet talk them with stories about high value data collection.

bragh 4y ago

If reddit ever gets rid of old.reddit.com, that is the day that I stop using it.

sva_ 4y ago
I think a lot of mods use it, and that's why they don't get rid of it - since reddit mods basically work for Reddit for free.

andrepd 4y ago

I'm still shook that the i.reddit.com interface still works and is virtually unchanged for over 10 years now! If only more companies followed that principle and just left the bloody interfaces alone unless that had a very good reason.

KronisLV 4y ago

> My Reddit usage has basically plummeted to 0 at this point because of their pushing me towards an app. My phone can't even work all that well with apps like that or Chrome browser/WebView for that matter. I use Opera on my phone because they allow me to have 50-100 tabs open with no issues, but maybe that's only passable because I never do anything important like banking on the phone anyways. So, whenever I'm coerced into installing an app for actually browsing content, reading comments, looking at media (vs something more one-off like ordering food/a ride), I just look the other way. Ergo, I never use Reddit on my phone without spoofing the user agent or whatever the "request desktop site" option in Opera does, but then the UI becomes unusable on a phone. Sadly, cases like mine don't show up in any metrics, nor do people care about that use case, so it's likely that this will keep being done a lot.

f1refly 4y ago
You can also use i.reddit.com or old.reddit.com, they're both mich better than the regular site and i.reddit.com is adapted to mobile.

laurencei 4y ago

Check out the "Apollo" reddit app. Its a 3rd party app for Reddit. I've started using it and would never go back to the native Reddit app. No ads, very fast, constant updates etc.

solarkraft 4y ago
I wish I knew why they're pushing the app so hard so I can specifically avoid doing that. If they want you to just have any app installed they'd win even if you install Apollo.
- 3np 4y ago
  If you don't require authenticated functionality: https://r.nf/ https://r.nf/ https://github.com/spikecodes/libreddit https://github.com/spikecodes/libreddit https://codeberg.org/teddit/teddit https://codeberg.org/teddit/teddit
- joshstrange 4y ago
  > If they want you to just have any app installed they'd win even if you install Apollo. Sorry but this just isn't true. They want the app for the tracking, push notifications, etc. Apollo doesn't have the tracking and does it's own push notifications (so you don't get Reddit's marketing-type notifications). Also it's much harder, if not impossible, to block ads in an app vs the web. Apollo has zero ads, they absolutely don't want you using it, even the web is better for Reddit. It's only a matter of time before they "Twitter" up their API even more than they already do. There are multiple things (stats, polls, certain profile features) that they don't expose through their API.
  - moneywoes 4y ago
    Does Apollo use their official apis won’t they just deprecate those like Twitter did?
    - joshstrange 4y ago
      Yep, that’s why I said this: > It's only a matter of time before they "Twitter" up their API even more than they already do. When that happens I imagine I’ll fall off of Reddit. “old.reddit.com” and Apollo are the only reasons it’s bearable to use other than a Google search destination. There is and will be for years if not decades a ton of important/useful information on reddit. Things like cooking tips, home server building, relatively unbiased product reviews, video game help, and the list goes on. A good portion of that content is evergreen. But as for participating, I won’t go back to the official app after using Apollo, even if that means leaving Reddit after over a decade.

maneesh 4y ago

I agree that Reddit pushes too hard to get people to use the mobile app. I found a good trick was to use AN app, just not their app. Apollo on iOS and Boost on android are really good alternatives to the official Reddit app, which is littered with ads.