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Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

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Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#191

Post by potatolicious »

kbenson wrote: post #159
biggerbistro wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it obvious that Voat would be filled with the more extreme forms of speech given that they are the ones not allowed on Reddit? Faulting Voat for that reason is kind of a clueless thing to do. If walking your dog becomes politically unfashionable tomorrow I'm sure they would be the next to migrate to Voat.

I think if there's a mass exodus from Reddit and the choice is Voat or something not Voat, the majority will choose not-Voat. If Voat hadn't absorbed much of the subreddits rejected for extreme and hate speech, then it would have a chance at growing with a more natural makeup. As it is now, any community that moved there would have to accept that there's a much higher percentage of extremist views there than present…

Agreed. If there's any migration it will likely be towards more actively moderated forums - if you just want to talk about slow cooker recipes you're probably not hoping that it comes with a side of genocide advocacy.

Reddit has been an interesting exercise in shaping online communities, and the zeitgeist has changed in response. Where extremist views were originally approached on the basis of maximum tolerance, the resulting loss of more mainstream users (and the extremist domination of even unrelated subreddits), has shifted away from it. My suspicion is that mainstream users will gravitate towards forums that have a heavier moderating hand.

An interesting question is if this will cause a general return to more independent, freestanding online communities (as opposed to Reddit's model of centralizing a vast number of topics under one roof).

Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#192

Post by wiremine »

root_axis wrote: post #168
wiremine wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but your data also supports the view that the redesign hastened Digg's death, and seems to correlate with increased growth at Reddit. I.e., Reddit was doing something right, and Digg was shrinking. The Digg redesign fiasco accelerated both trends.

I won't argue that, but I think the trend data makes a convincing case that Reddit's rise and Digg's demise were inevitable, regardless of Digg's redesign failure.

Perhaps. Had they handled the redesign correctly, things may have turned out differently. It was a perfect storm of design, technology and technology failure...

Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#193

Post by Mahn »

mbesto wrote: post #174
pmoriarty wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't think of a single popular site redesign that actually made the site better. They're almost inevitably worse, usually much worse. A common failing is trying to make the design more shiny and pretty while decreasing functionality, dumbing the site down, adding bloat, and slowing the site down to a crawl. I really hope Reddit does not go down this road, because they really have a good thing going now. It would b…

> I can't think of a single popular site redesign that actually made the site better. Depends on your definition of "better". Facebook has done several redesigns that the audience has groaned about and here we are 1 billion users later. TechCrunch did a large redesign several years, and here we are, still reading TC articles. The list goes on and on...

> still reading TC articles

That's debatable (albeit for reasons other than design)

Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#194

Post by throw2016 »

I am not sure discussion sites like Slashdot, Reddit can run or scale as businesses. And retain credibility with the majority of their users.

As founder run sites with income to sustain the site it works but the moment founders become 'distant' and obsessed with commercial objectives the site sort of loses its focus and there is a slow decline.

Reddit only took off because it as seen an low key non-commercial alternative to the 'over commercial' Digg. Now it doesn't have that feel anymore and this can only end badly.

Even HN is not a profit making site, but delivers value to ycombinator outside of that.

Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#195

Post by optimuspaul »

celticninja wrote: post #32
imjk wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hacker News

I think it is starting to happen already. A few too many jokey comments appearing, puns and the like.

I love the joke comments and puns. It makes me sad when they are down voted.

Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#196

Post by yoodenvranx »

kilroy123 wrote: post #50
yoodenvranx wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the company is literally re-writing all of its code The old and ugly mobile website is _perfect_ (apart from some bugs). The new one is a horrible piece of garbage.

I disagree. I use the extension reddit enhancement suite and _that_ makes it useable.

I am talking about mobile, not desktop. On desktop I also use RES, but on mobile I am fine with the old mobile website.

Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#197

Post by greenshackle2 »

herrkanin wrote: post #90
debacle wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The free speech part of Voat is great. I don't think it's so much overrun as that the only people there are the ones with radical opinions. I wouldn't use Voat for other reasons, but that's just me.

I will never understand this romanticising of free speech on private platforms. Why would a service that cares about its members _ever_ implement free speech policies? That's just asking for assholes. If anything, popular services should have _more_ filtering and removal of asshole users.

The problem is that in the space of {things that are unmentionable in polite company}, there may be a few nuggets of important new ideas, but those nuggets are lost in a torrent of shit.

I think it's important to be able to discuss taboo topics to find those important nuggets. From my perspective it's not totally crazy to have complete free speech platforms to pursue that goal, but it's probably better done in private among trusted friends, where it has been established that you are not generally assholes, than on a semi-public platform, where you will drown in a torrent of shit brought on by the mass of contrarian assholes who will inevitably flock to the platform.

It's analogous to Peter Thiel and Paul Graham's argument that most successful startups will look like bad ideas at the outset. (http://www.businessinsider.com/this-venn-diagram-shows-why-s...)

An Important New Truth probably looks stupid at first, otherwise someone else would have figured it out already.

Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#198

Post by wl »

sirtastic wrote: post #101
pmoriarty wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't think of a single popular site redesign that actually made the site better. They're almost inevitably worse, usually much worse. A common failing is trying to make the design more shiny and pretty while decreasing functionality, dumbing the site down, adding bloat, and slowing the site down to a crawl. I really hope Reddit does not go down this road, because they really have a good thing going now. It would b…

I can think of one. Google's material design. I love it and feel it tied their apps together while making them easier to use.

Material design ruined Google News on the desktop.

Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#199

Post by flying_kangaroo »

beepboopbeep wrote: post #147
stevenj wrote: post #3

>the company is literally re-writing all of its code Wow. >An early version of the new design, which we saw during our interview, looks similar to Facebook’s News Feed or Twitter’s Timeline: A never-ending feed of content broken up into “cards” with more visuals to lure people into the conversations hidden underneath. >“We want Reddit to be more visually appealing,” he explained, “so when new users come to Reddit the…

Didn't DIGG try a similar approach? I can't quite remember what killed DIGG off for most folks

From what I remember it was mostly too many advertisers trying to push their accounts/products to the front page and killing a lot of the user-generated content people wanted.

Helped that reddit was primed and ready as exactly the site the migrators were looking for. We don't quite have the same alternatives ready to go rn.

Re: Reddit raises $200M at a $1.8B valuation

#200

Post by fweespeech »

am1988 wrote: post #111
uncoder0 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Voat ( https://voat.co/ ) is also an option I've heard of before but never used. However I just looked at their front page and the number 2 post is titled 'How to solve the Voat's antisemitism problem' and the image contains an antisemitic slur so that's not very promising.

Isn't Voat where The_Donald threatened to go when they finally got slapped around for their antics?

It was amusing when Voat booted them out by refusing to tolerate their power mod-y BS.

Watching that little civil war was entertaining.

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