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Those who only take a cursory glance will assume that Reddit started as a porn site, with nsfw dominating. This is of course contrary to how most of us remember

Those who only take a cursory glance will assume that Reddit started as a porn site, with nsfw dominating. This is of course contrary to how most of us remember it. If you delve deeper, it is actually that Reddit started entirely without subs, and happened to mostly be programming related, with a smattering of politics. nsfw was created because, much like with the TLD debate on the same topic, it was a content category that people wanted to separate. As the "subless" Reddit started to get noisy with mainstream topics, that's when people started fracturing off to /r/programming.

at-fates-hands 13y ago
A few years ago, I heard the same thing, then went and checked out the archive and it was about the furthest thing from the truth. Screenshot from 2005 of the home page: https://web.archive.org/web/20050804002153/http://www.reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20050804002153/http://www.reddit...
- corresation 13y ago
  EDIT: Apologies, however I misunderstood at-fates-hands's point of contention, however leave this post just for the neat archive.org links. What is the "furthest thing from the truth"? While you selectively chose a generalist front page, how about- https://web.archive.org/web/20051204033222/http://reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20051204033222/http://reddit.com...? A Ruby post up at number 1. Heck, almost all of the front page is exactly the sort of material you would find on HN. Another 2005 day - https://web.archive.org/web/20051230160447/http://reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20051230160447/http://reddit.com...? Another day with four LISP front-pagers - https://web.archive.org/web/20051210015338/http://reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20051210015338/http://reddit.com...? Every post wasn't always about programming specifically, but it was a site primarily populated by programmers and other IT professionals, which is how what would be fringe material topped the front page. But there was the other stuff, just as there is on HN. Just to make an aside about something I found interesting on the archived reddit page - the header "reddit learns what you like as you vote on existing links or submit your own!". The premise was that Reddit would use clustering and other intelligent logic to individualize itself to the viewer. They abandoned that and went the "subscribe to subs you like" notion.
  - seiji 13y ago
    Reddit was released to the world by a link on paulgraham.com. It had an impact on the initial user census. It took a while for all the cat picture morons to take it over.
    - davidw 13y ago
      Exactly - that's how I found reddit, back in the day. First it was mostly hacking, startups, and some libertarian politics. Then there started to be more politics, and less hacking and startups. And more "outrage stories". And it went downhill fast enough that PG started Hacker News. That's one of the reasons I loathe the political stories so much - they build a momentum of their own and wreck sites like this one. Interestingly enough, you can see PG helping to get reddit off the ground: https://web.archive.org/web/20050725010627/http://reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20050725010627/http://reddit.com... "bugbear" is PG. Edit, I think it was through this essay: http://www.reddit.com/comments/20775 http://www.reddit.com/comments/20775
  - rmc 13y ago
    Heck, almost all of the front page is exactly the sort of material you would find on HN. I believe HN was originally set up to be "like how reddit used to be"
  - at-fates-hands 13y ago
    >>> What is the "furthest thing from the truth"? It was poorly worded so I apologize for that. I meant that I heard the same thing as @corresation that it was mainly a porn site at first, which wasn't true at all.
fragmede 13y ago
> Still, the graph shows the site’s beginnings in the primordial muck of porn and programming. The r/NSFW subreddit was one of the first, Olson explains (though he notes that the site was never 100 percent NSFW; his graph leaves out /r/reddit.com for purposes of legibility.) FTA
timcederman 13y ago
Did the graph get updated? The one I'm looking at shows nsfw peaking at 5%, but only ever being a small fraction of the total content.
- corresation 13y ago
  http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/design/2014/01/reddit1.jpg http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/design/2014/01/reddit1.jpg That's the current graph, seemingly showing nsfw as 100% of Reddit content at the beginning of 2006.
  - timcederman 13y ago
    Looks like an error to me. Here's their second graph. http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/design/2014/01/SubredditGrowthOverTime-2006.png http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/design/2014/01/SubredditGr...
    - bjz_ 13y ago
      Buried in the text: > He notes that the site was never 100 percent NSFW; his graph leaves out /r/reddit.com for purposes of legibility. This is a problem of poor axis labelling. It should be: "Fraction of posts submitted to Reddit.com (excluding /r/reddit.com)". The other issue is that the other graphs that include /r/reddit.com are hidden in the slideshow at the top. It's clearer in the actual blog post: http://www.randalolson.com/2013/03/12/retracing-the-evolution-of-reddit-through-post-data/ http://www.randalolson.com/2013/03/12/retracing-the-evolutio...

at-fates-hands 13y ago

A few years ago, I heard the same thing, then went and checked out the archive and it was about the furthest thing from the truth. Screenshot from 2005 of the home page: https://web.archive.org/web/20050804002153/http://www.reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20050804002153/http://www.reddit...

corresation 13y ago
EDIT: Apologies, however I misunderstood at-fates-hands's point of contention, however leave this post just for the neat archive.org links. What is the "furthest thing from the truth"? While you selectively chose a generalist front page, how about- https://web.archive.org/web/20051204033222/http://reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20051204033222/http://reddit.com...? A Ruby post up at number 1. Heck, almost all of the front page is exactly the sort of material you would find on HN. Another 2005 day - https://web.archive.org/web/20051230160447/http://reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20051230160447/http://reddit.com...? Another day with four LISP front-pagers - https://web.archive.org/web/20051210015338/http://reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20051210015338/http://reddit.com...? Every post wasn't always about programming specifically, but it was a site primarily populated by programmers and other IT professionals, which is how what would be fringe material topped the front page. But there was the other stuff, just as there is on HN. Just to make an aside about something I found interesting on the archived reddit page - the header "reddit learns what you like as you vote on existing links or submit your own!". The premise was that Reddit would use clustering and other intelligent logic to individualize itself to the viewer. They abandoned that and went the "subscribe to subs you like" notion.
- seiji 13y ago
  Reddit was released to the world by a link on paulgraham.com. It had an impact on the initial user census. It took a while for all the cat picture morons to take it over.
  - davidw 13y ago
    Exactly - that's how I found reddit, back in the day. First it was mostly hacking, startups, and some libertarian politics. Then there started to be more politics, and less hacking and startups. And more "outrage stories". And it went downhill fast enough that PG started Hacker News. That's one of the reasons I loathe the political stories so much - they build a momentum of their own and wreck sites like this one. Interestingly enough, you can see PG helping to get reddit off the ground: https://web.archive.org/web/20050725010627/http://reddit.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20050725010627/http://reddit.com... "bugbear" is PG. Edit, I think it was through this essay: http://www.reddit.com/comments/20775 http://www.reddit.com/comments/20775
- rmc 13y ago
  Heck, almost all of the front page is exactly the sort of material you would find on HN. I believe HN was originally set up to be "like how reddit used to be"
- at-fates-hands 13y ago
  >>> What is the "furthest thing from the truth"? It was poorly worded so I apologize for that. I meant that I heard the same thing as @corresation that it was mainly a porn site at first, which wasn't true at all.

fragmede 13y ago

> Still, the graph shows the site’s beginnings in the primordial muck of porn and programming. The r/NSFW subreddit was one of the first, Olson explains (though he notes that the site was never 100 percent NSFW; his graph leaves out /r/reddit.com for purposes of legibility.) FTA

timcederman 13y ago

Did the graph get updated? The one I'm looking at shows nsfw peaking at 5%, but only ever being a small fraction of the total content.

corresation 13y ago
http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/design/2014/01/reddit1.jpg http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/design/2014/01/reddit1.jpg That's the current graph, seemingly showing nsfw as 100% of Reddit content at the beginning of 2006.
- timcederman 13y ago
  Looks like an error to me. Here's their second graph. http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/design/2014/01/SubredditGrowthOverTime-2006.png http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/design/2014/01/SubredditGr...
  - bjz_ 13y ago
    Buried in the text: > He notes that the site was never 100 percent NSFW; his graph leaves out /r/reddit.com for purposes of legibility. This is a problem of poor axis labelling. It should be: "Fraction of posts submitted to Reddit.com (excluding /r/reddit.com)". The other issue is that the other graphs that include /r/reddit.com are hidden in the slideshow at the top. It's clearer in the actual blog post: http://www.randalolson.com/2013/03/12/retracing-the-evolution-of-reddit-through-post-data/ http://www.randalolson.com/2013/03/12/retracing-the-evolutio...