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Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

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Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#71

Post by bfuller »

ythn wrote: post #70
slg wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The stories of Reddit's problems with harassment, racism, and sexism have decreased over the last year but that appears to be mostly from the site doing a better job of hiding it. There is still just as much hate on the site except now it is just seething under the surface. I am sure that is better from an investor perspective, but it isn't really a solution to the problems.

> There is still just as much hate on the site except now it is just seething under the surface Yeah but if your vast majority of users doesn't see it or know where to find it, who cares? I've been a reddit user for 2 years and never encountered the subreddits you are talking about nor have I sought them out. The "solution" you are talking about is heavy-handed speech moderation

Heavy handed speech moderation is what is starting to happen on reddit.

It works on HN

Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#72

Post by etjossem »

pentagonpapers wrote: post #62
etjossem wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of presenting unsubstantiated claims as fact, please cite your sources so we know where you're coming from.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correct_the_Record

From your source:

- The DNC was not paying Correct The Record. Like all super PACs, Correct The Record made independent expenditures on behalf of supportive donors around the country, and you can find their names here: https://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/pacgave2.php?cycle=2016&cmt...

- Correct The Record had about a dozen full-time content producers writing favorable posts about the Democratic candidate online.

I'm not seeing any references to improper payments made by the DNC, nor do I see the Reddit connection. While we're on the topic of independent expenditures, would you like to talk about the 328 million Russian Twitter accounts that were used in the general election to produce paid pro-Trump content?

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/07/us/politics/russia-facebo...

Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#73

Post by TheAdamAndChe »

ythn wrote: post #70
slg wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The stories of Reddit's problems with harassment, racism, and sexism have decreased over the last year but that appears to be mostly from the site doing a better job of hiding it. There is still just as much hate on the site except now it is just seething under the surface. I am sure that is better from an investor perspective, but it isn't really a solution to the problems.

> There is still just as much hate on the site except now it is just seething under the surface Yeah but if your vast majority of users doesn't see it or know where to find it, who cares? I've been a reddit user for 2 years and never encountered the subreddits you are talking about nor have I sought them out. The "solution" you are talking about is heavy-handed speech moderation

> if your vast majority of users doesn't see it or know where to find it, who cares?

If those channels become extremist echo chambers, then the government could care when terrorists start being made on the site, affecting Reddit's PR in the long run. I know of several subs that are full of such extremist vitriol. Since they're a global website, they've got to consider things like long-term social impacts of their content.

Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#74

Post by komali2 »

squeaky-clean wrote: post #67
komali2 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps I am looking for an opportunity to express even more gratitude, considering the OP could be committing an actual crime to bring us content :) Or, I am curious why the OP is willing to take this risk for us. Really, though, I am just curious if I would get in trouble for doing the same down the line ;)

What risk though? The worst I could ever see coming from this is HN deleting your comment and banning your account. Has anyone ever actually been fined for resharing an article text in a webforum comment?

That sounds to me like a risk! I like commenting here.

Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#75

Post by kn0thing »

hglaser wrote: post #60
zerostar07 wrote: post #52

I wondef how they manage to increase revenue. Their self serve ad manager looks like a joke.

It's likely that the largest advertisers don't use the self-serve ad manager. They call their rep who operates the system for them. This is why the self-serve ad managers for AdWords, Facebook Ads, etc. are all pretty unloved.

Yes. The team has started making some good improvements to self serve, though, and it'll keep getting better.

Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#76

Post by pentagonpapers »

etjossem wrote: post #72
pentagonpapers wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correct_the_Record

From your source: - The DNC was not paying Correct The Record. Like all super PACs, Correct The Record made independent expenditures on behalf of supportive donors around the country, and you can find their names here: https://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/pacgave2.php?cycle=2016&cmt... - Correct The Record had about a dozen full-time content producers writing favorable posts about the Democratic candidate online. I'm not…

> The DNC was not paying Correct The Record as you claim; they were independently funded by donors around the country, all of whom are listed here:

Super PACs have NEVER taken advice or worked directly with national campaigns. (they verifiably do)

> Correct The Record had about a dozen full-time content producers writing favorable posts about the Democratic candidate online.

> If this was supposed to be your evidence of a vast DNC conspiracy to ruin Reddit, I'm incredibly disappointed.

I would say reddit going from a place that once supported open and free ideas, to one that only pretends to, is a very dangerous thing. Shilling is real, people are paid to do it. On both sides. Clearly the left wing has the advantage on reddit.

> And given the 328 million Russian Twitter accounts used in the general election to produce paid pro-Trump content, do you really want to have this conversation?

NYtimes writing slam pieces about our president? More fake russian collusion stories? Color me shocked. I don't trust the media, and neither should you. The whole Russia story is hogwash.

Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#77

Post by slg »

ythn wrote: post #70
slg wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The stories of Reddit's problems with harassment, racism, and sexism have decreased over the last year but that appears to be mostly from the site doing a better job of hiding it. There is still just as much hate on the site except now it is just seething under the surface. I am sure that is better from an investor perspective, but it isn't really a solution to the problems.

> There is still just as much hate on the site except now it is just seething under the surface Yeah but if your vast majority of users doesn't see it or know where to find it, who cares? I've been a reddit user for 2 years and never encountered the subreddits you are talking about nor have I sought them out. The "solution" you are talking about is heavy-handed speech moderation

These things never stay contained though. The hate subreddits feed off of and seep into the rest of the site. In the old days someone had to make a conscious decision to visit a site like Stromfront. You weren't going to go there unless you already were interested in racist ideals. On Reddit those ideals are mixed in with everything else. This makes it harder to notice you are being exposed to hate and/or influenced by it. The end result is that Reddit is a boom to recruiting for hate groups.

There are three main ways of interacting with Reddit: posting, voting, and commenting. Hiding the obvious hate subreddits helped address the posting of topics. That was an important step and I don't want to diminish it. Reddit has tried to address the voting aspect with various tweaks to the ranking algorithm but whether it has been effective is still debatable. They haven't done anything as far as I'm aware to address hate comments. That is left completely up to the users and moderators.

Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#78

Post by tzahola »

etjossem wrote: post #72
pentagonpapers wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correct_the_Record

From your source: - The DNC was not paying Correct The Record. Like all super PACs, Correct The Record made independent expenditures on behalf of supportive donors around the country, and you can find their names here: https://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/pacgave2.php?cycle=2016&cmt... - Correct The Record had about a dozen full-time content producers writing favorable posts about the Democratic candidate online. I'm not…

Thank You for Correcting The Record!

Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#79

Post by darkmarmot »

vxNsr wrote: post #18

Interesting that he named his daughter after himself. I guess having a unisex name had its benefits. More importantly,I agree that reddit's public perception had changed a lot in the last year, it went from seeming like a boys club where others were tolerated to being totally nondinominational. Obviously there are still some subs that are pretty insular but for the most part as they've grown they've gotten nicer.

It's nice as long as you don't criticize their advertisers. The admins shadow-banned my 8-yr old account for criticizing a sponsored post from AMC.

Re: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Steps Aside, Focuses on Initialized Capital

#80

Post by Karunamon »

autotune wrote: post #47
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Reddit is doing far far worse than even Twitter at combatting these issues Do you have a source for this claim? Genuine question. Searching Google Scholar for "flame wars" or "Twitter Reddit sentiment" failed to produce anything useful.

/r/HailCorporate has plenty examples where corporations can be shown manipulating Reddit on a daily basis. I have to use a word search and replace plugin just to restore some amount of sanity to content and even then it's iffy.

/r/HailCorporate is an echo chamber that insists any time a brand is so much as mentioned without negativity, it must necessarily be an attempt at viral marketing.

Meanwhile in the real world, people talk about brands in everyday conversation all the time without the sanction of the corporation behind it. Not that paid shilling isn't a thing, but they take the confirmation bias, way too far, to the point where calling shenanigans will get you attacked.

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