4 ms·

I've watched a notable decline in Reddit content quality the past few years. Obvious engagement farming posts that I didn't used to see. A low quality jpeg of a

by hbn 2y ago

I've watched a notable decline in Reddit content quality the past few years. Obvious engagement farming posts that I didn't used to see. A low quality jpeg of a character from the TV show the reddit is about, titled "who else agrees this character is the worst!" People just asking open-ended questions because it'll get everyone commenting, even if the question isn't very interesting. I have to assume because of the growing phenomenon of Reddit being the only valuable results returned from Google, it's becoming more valuable for companies to astroturf Reddit content that will appear in Google. So there must be either bot-run accounts, or some kind of business of karma farming to later sell off accounts with karma that won't get flagged for spam when they start endlessly posting about how great [PRODUCT] is.

DyslexicAtheist 2y ago
personally I never see Reddit results in Google. It's always Quora and Pinterest that are spamming the results
- tehwebguy 2y ago
  The idea is that adding "reddit" to your search term is the key to getting decent results. As this 2021 tweet says with some exaggeration: > u can google ur questions about the world and get the CIA FBI answer or u can add "reddit" to the end of it and learn the truth https://twitter.com/darlingube/status/1371899624491995137 https://twitter.com/darlingube/status/1371899624491995137
- dialup_sounds 2y ago
  The meme is that appending "reddit" to your searches is the cheat code to access high quality organic results written by actual humans. It's basically internalized SEO--you don't have to spam your way into search results if you convince users to search for you intentionally.
- demondemidi 2y ago
  Reddit is usually the 3rd or 4th source that pops up. And I've googled things from bicycles to hot tubs to food cart recommendations. Reddit is pervasive in my experience. And I don't even use Reddit.
dheera 2y ago
Maybe but the current state of Reddit may actually be super, super useful for RLHF training if they take into account the up/down votes. If used this way low-quality content is GOOD for OpenAI's training as long as it gets accurately downvoted.
- grepfru_it 2y ago
  Voting there isn’t real, many subreddits are simply echo chambers with the hive mind downvoting because you said something different
  - dheera 2y ago
    Perhaps that could be normalized for? And if you consider multiple subreddits you might recover some diversity of opinions?
    - hbn 2y ago
      There's no content to balance it out with. Stepping outside of the popular opinion and getting immediately downvoted so nobody sees it, you might as well not have commented at all. Eventually all dissenters stop commenting.
      - jamilton 2y ago
        But you can go to non-mainstream subs where there's a different voting population and that doesn't happen (well, it does, but the "popular opinion" can be different within the sub).
- epolanski 2y ago
  People use down and upvotes based on what they like/dislike. Thus, most top comments are jokes. Anything informed but controversial will be buried down deep and can be only found by sorting for..controversial.
- jamilton 2y ago
  GPT-2's dataset used every reddit post with more than 3 net votes as training data, IIRC. Seems likely they've iterated on that approach since.
willsmith72 2y ago
i think the stuff you're talking about is just part of the changing demographic it's the same as facebook and twitter. gradually it turns into boomer memes which get more engagement from the increasingly mainstream audience
- hbn 2y ago
  Twitter's viral content farming started overnight when Musk started paying people for views. Prior to that, viral content usually felt pretty organic and decent.
SamuelAdams 2y ago
Actually repeated, bot posted topics might not be bad for AI training. Maybe AI can learn sentiment by seeing answers to the same question change over the course of several years. Examples from the current top rated askreddit monthly thread: Scientific breakthrough https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1c9kenq/what_scientific_breakthrough_are_we_closer_to/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1c9kenq/what_sci... https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/wrbrs9/what_science_breakthrough_do_you_believe_will/ https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/wrbrs9/what_scie... https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/x17fuf/what_scientific_breakthroughstechnologies_are_we/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/x17fuf/what_scie... Travel Tips https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/10iptoa/what_is_your_best_travel_tip_that_most_people/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/10iptoa/what_is_... https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/ueoys0/what_travel_tips_do_only_the_pros_know/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/ueoys0/what_trav... https://www.reddit.com/r/travel/comments/16lzwfc/what_are_your_best_tips_to_prepare_for_an/ https://www.reddit.com/r/travel/comments/16lzwfc/what_are_yo... https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1iqvhc/whats_your_best_travel_tip/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1iqvhc/whats_you...
raydev 2y ago
I curated my personal front page years ago, and don't see engagement farming posts that I also don't mind seeing. It's honestly as great as ever for me, and I've been reading/commenting for 12+ years!

by hbn 2y ago

DyslexicAtheist 2y ago

personally I never see Reddit results in Google. It's always Quora and Pinterest that are spamming the results

tehwebguy 2y ago
The idea is that adding "reddit" to your search term is the key to getting decent results. As this 2021 tweet says with some exaggeration: > u can google ur questions about the world and get the CIA FBI answer or u can add "reddit" to the end of it and learn the truth https://twitter.com/darlingube/status/1371899624491995137 https://twitter.com/darlingube/status/1371899624491995137
dialup_sounds 2y ago
The meme is that appending "reddit" to your searches is the cheat code to access high quality organic results written by actual humans. It's basically internalized SEO--you don't have to spam your way into search results if you convince users to search for you intentionally.
demondemidi 2y ago
Reddit is usually the 3rd or 4th source that pops up. And I've googled things from bicycles to hot tubs to food cart recommendations. Reddit is pervasive in my experience. And I don't even use Reddit.

dheera 2y ago

Maybe but the current state of Reddit may actually be super, super useful for RLHF training if they take into account the up/down votes. If used this way low-quality content is GOOD for OpenAI's training as long as it gets accurately downvoted.

grepfru_it 2y ago
Voting there isn’t real, many subreddits are simply echo chambers with the hive mind downvoting because you said something different
- dheera 2y ago
  Perhaps that could be normalized for? And if you consider multiple subreddits you might recover some diversity of opinions?
  - hbn 2y ago
    There's no content to balance it out with. Stepping outside of the popular opinion and getting immediately downvoted so nobody sees it, you might as well not have commented at all. Eventually all dissenters stop commenting.
    - jamilton 2y ago
      But you can go to non-mainstream subs where there's a different voting population and that doesn't happen (well, it does, but the "popular opinion" can be different within the sub).
epolanski 2y ago
People use down and upvotes based on what they like/dislike. Thus, most top comments are jokes. Anything informed but controversial will be buried down deep and can be only found by sorting for..controversial.
jamilton 2y ago
GPT-2's dataset used every reddit post with more than 3 net votes as training data, IIRC. Seems likely they've iterated on that approach since.

willsmith72 2y ago

i think the stuff you're talking about is just part of the changing demographic it's the same as facebook and twitter. gradually it turns into boomer memes which get more engagement from the increasingly mainstream audience

hbn 2y ago
Twitter's viral content farming started overnight when Musk started paying people for views. Prior to that, viral content usually felt pretty organic and decent.

SamuelAdams 2y ago

Actually repeated, bot posted topics might not be bad for AI training. Maybe AI can learn sentiment by seeing answers to the same question change over the course of several years. Examples from the current top rated askreddit monthly thread: Scientific breakthrough https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1c9kenq/what_scientific_breakthrough_are_we_closer_to/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1c9kenq/what_sci... https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/wrbrs9/what_science_breakthrough_do_you_believe_will/ https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/wrbrs9/what_scie... https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/x17fuf/what_scientific_breakthroughstechnologies_are_we/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/x17fuf/what_scie... Travel Tips https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/10iptoa/what_is_your_best_travel_tip_that_most_people/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/10iptoa/what_is_... https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/ueoys0/what_travel_tips_do_only_the_pros_know/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/ueoys0/what_trav... https://www.reddit.com/r/travel/comments/16lzwfc/what_are_your_best_tips_to_prepare_for_an/ https://www.reddit.com/r/travel/comments/16lzwfc/what_are_yo... https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1iqvhc/whats_your_best_travel_tip/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1iqvhc/whats_you...

raydev 2y ago

I curated my personal front page years ago, and don't see engagement farming posts that I also don't mind seeing. It's honestly as great as ever for me, and I've been reading/commenting for 12+ years!