Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Reddit launches image uploads, ditching alliance with Imgur

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 414 posts

Re: Reddit launches image uploads, ditching alliance with Imgur

#31

Post by finnn »

Others wrote: post #25
zitterbewegung wrote: post #18

Having a third party host Reddit's images gave away a bunch of control to the point that imgur has its own community based upon the site . At the time Reddit didn't have the resources to make a competitor but this seems to be a good move now that imgur is doing dark patterns.

What dark patterns are they implementing?

"direct" links to an image uploaded sometimes/usually redirect to imgur page, with lots of ads and shitty content, obnoxious, animated overlays that block out part of the image on mobile, etc

Re: Reddit launches image uploads, ditching alliance with Imgur

#32

Post by zitterbewegung »

Others wrote: post #25
zitterbewegung wrote: post #18

Having a third party host Reddit's images gave away a bunch of control to the point that imgur has its own community based upon the site . At the time Reddit didn't have the resources to make a competitor but this seems to be a good move now that imgur is doing dark patterns.

What dark patterns are they implementing?

Other comments on this thread say image posts not working on mobile and virus warning ads .

Re: Reddit launches image uploads, ditching alliance with Imgur

#33

Post by [deleted] »

zitterbewegung wrote: post #18

Having a third party host Reddit's images gave away a bunch of control to the point that imgur has its own community based upon the site . At the time Reddit didn't have the resources to make a competitor but this seems to be a good move now that imgur is doing dark patterns.

[deleted]

Re: Reddit launches image uploads, ditching alliance with Imgur

#36

Post by siegecraft »

The imgur hate in here is odd. It seems like people are just assuming the worst based on one critical comment thread that got turned into a techcrunch article. Which is understandable, I don't understand how they can offer a free unlimited image hosting site (and they've offered it for so long that, well, you can see the backlash they got when direct linking is taken away). Still, their management seems savvy enough to know that they would have to carefully manage that change.

There's at least two distinct types of imgur users, those who only use imgur as an image host and "imgurians." The huge usage numbers come from the former while the actual value (IMHO) is in the unpaid labor of the latter group (like most social media). That means imgur can piss off their freeloaders as long as they don't upset their community, but this is really no help at all because the community is far more critical than the freeloaders. Freeloaders don't care about imgur's community drama.

Re: Reddit launches image uploads, ditching alliance with Imgur

#37

Post by Endy »

pfarnsworth wrote: post #15

I don't know why reddit would want to take on the burden and cost of dealing with images. It might make it incrementally easier, but with something like RES the entire thing was seamless. Seems like a misplaced focus on a feature that doesn't bring that much value, and a lot more cost. I'll be curious to see how successful this ends up being. If they wanted to concentrate on making the site easier to use, they should…

It's basically their way to control the content that gets posted to the platform; I'd be surprised if a lot of subreddits don't get shut down if they switch to using it rather than imgur or reddpics.

Re: Reddit launches image uploads, ditching alliance with Imgur

#38

Post by dopamean »

finnn wrote: post #31
Others wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What dark patterns are they implementing?

"direct" links to an image uploaded sometimes/usually redirect to imgur page, with lots of ads and shitty content, obnoxious, animated overlays that block out part of the image on mobile, etc

Weird. I've never experienced this or heard of it.

Re: Reddit launches image uploads, ditching alliance with Imgur

#39

Post by static_noise »

goalieca wrote: post #12
wlesieutre wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. Imgur realized that being solely a user-friendly image host wasn't much of a money maker, so they started gradually turning into the Photobucket style messes that it was originally aiming to destroy. Now they run their own community/discussion site and try to show it down the throat of anyone who lands there trying to look at a picture. It's not been good for the user experience of anyone who was just there for…

Question. What's wrong with making just a little bit of money?? (which is presumably still more than i will ever see!)

In some fields the winner takes it all. Either you win or you die.

Also money is like a drug. What's wrong with taking a little cocaine in the morning and a little heroin in the evening? Nothing, except there are very few people who can sustain that over an extended period of time. You also wouldn't know about them because they neither become very rich nor very famous. ("Hey look there is the most average guy in the whole country who has no exceptional qualities.") The world belongs to the candles who burn from both ends.

Re: Reddit launches image uploads, ditching alliance with Imgur

#40

Post by ashitlerferad »

static_noise wrote: post #4
Dramatize wrote: post #2

It seemed like Imgur has been getting ready for this for awhile. The experience using it hasn't been that great since direct linking stopped working on mobile.

Last time I've opened an imgur link on mobile I got served with an ad popup and a "virus warning" dialog. That is something I haven't seen in a long time. Imgur seems to go the way of SourceForge.

SourceForge got bought by new folks who reversed all the misleading ads and bundling stuff:

https://sourceforge.net/blog/sourceforge-acquisition-and-fut...

Post reply on HN