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‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

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Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#191

Post by kevindong »

lechiffre10 wrote: post #18

I've significantly reduced my time on Reddit. Used to pull up the website out of curiosity every day but the atmosphere is incredibly toxic. My front page was riddled with Russiagate stuff too for some reason and every time you'd bring up an argument that isn't the norm you get a mob after you.

I personally go to Reddit to relax and not fret about the state of the world. So, I unsubscribed to all of the serious or semi-serious subreddits (all news, politics, etc.).

Turns out if you unsubscribe from all of those types of subs, Reddit becomes a really funny and interesting time killer where the community actively tries to come up with ways to make you laugh.

Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#192

Post by raquo »

dmix wrote: post #167
staplers wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same could be said about the internet in general. Take a stroll away from Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc and you can find some really interesting places with extremely insightful and meaningful content. The problem is that a majority of people are just absolutely manipulated by their emotions and dive head first into the feedback loop designed by social media to provide an addictive stream of never-ending enga…

Are you assuming they would have sought out longer form or higher tier content otherwise? My dad was extremely happy using Stumbleupon for years. It was about as high-pace low-quality you could get on the internet. I showed him sites like Reddit and elsewhere but he was very content with just Stumbling. People like to blame FB/Twitter for low quality content without considering the huge market for that stuff. People…

I definitely think that dumb content makes the consumer dumber with repeated exposure just like smart/educational content makes them smarter (well, in simple terms). I don't think there is a baseline intelligence level for each person below which they can't possibly fall regardless of what they do.

So yes, platforms making dumb content more available do make people dumber long term. I don't know what to do about it, but at least we have to recognize that this is a legit problem.

Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#193

Post by jpzisme »

/r/mma is an absolute gem. /r/BlackPeopleTwitter is great as well.

I'm also getting tired of these apology tours from SV people. The biggest flaw they have (aside from collecting scary amounts of data) is seemingly taking a too-rosy view of people. It'd be more refreshing for somebody to stand up and quote a somewhat notorious fighter by saying, "I'd like to take this chance to apologize... to absolutely nobody."

Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#194

Post by spike021 »

staplers wrote: post #70
abnry wrote: post #17

I think there is a very important distinction that needs to be made. The popular reddit experience is vastly worse than the customized reddit. It took me a while to realize that my reddit experience was vastly improved once I was very picky about which subreddits I follow.

The same could be said about the internet in general. Take a stroll away from Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc and you can find some really interesting places with extremely insightful and meaningful content. The problem is that a majority of people are just absolutely manipulated by their emotions and dive head first into the feedback loop designed by social media to provide an addictive stream of never-ending enga…

Really? I find "really interesting places with extremely insightful and meaningful content" all the time.

If not for Facebook or Twitter I likely would've never found The Athletic, a newer news media website for sports. I doubt they'd have just advertised on ESPN or some other sports broadcast channel website. Some of the content there has been incredibly insightful and meaningful. I even find articles from there on Twitter that I wouldn't normally have seen since I have the content from there filtered to what I like in my day to day consumption.

Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#195

Post by phil21 »

wvenable wrote: post #142
UncleEntity wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a dangerous trend for both society and reddit itself. Wouldn't squashing the voices of the "right-wing contingent" just lead to an (already implied) echo chamber of leftist thought? Your one single comment sums up the problem I have with user-moderation systems like reddit (and HN).

What ever happened to neutrality? Moderators shouldn't be promoting an ideology left or right. I understand that Reddit admins themselves don't want to promote an ideology either -- they want to remain neutral -- but they are sacrificing their platform to people who don't hold he same ideals. The biggest change I've noticed is just how political the city/country subreddits have become. A few years ago, they used to b…

> they used to be more fun places but now nearly all the content is very hateful and polarizing.

I don't think this is a reddit thing - it's a societal thing.

Other platforms are also getting far more acerbic in general. City council meetings, local news, etc. It seems the country is in a period of time where politics is both forefront and rather contentious.

I feel the stuff on-line is simply reflecting the greater societal trends - jut with the typical amplification everything on-line breeds.

Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#196

Post by mercer »

0xffff2 wrote: post #53
ggregoire wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, how did it work before adding the subs? A single board like HN, but without any specific topics? It seems crazy. I can't imagine Reddit without subs.

Yes. That was a long time ago. The total volume of reddit at that time was probably smaller than even a moderately larger subreddit today.

Seeing the 'average' number of upvotes rise steadily was a really strange experience for me. Hearing people in my various social groups talk about reddit though, was really strange, and sometimes it still feels strange how I can mention reddit to people with the assumption that at least they've heard of it and understand the basic concept.

Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#197

Post by hobofan »

vermontdevil wrote: post #97
jamiegreen wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Favourite subs you would recommend?

/r/spacex this is a fantastic group. heavily moderated /r/askhistorians /r/apple I am forgetting a few more.

/r/spacex is very Musk-fanboyish, which I guess is to be expected. The overall positive energy there these days is nice though, and the dedication that peaks in quasi-corporate-espionage is pretty cool.

Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#198

Post by Woofles »

alehul wrote: post #132
psychometry wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ones about things you are interested in...

I'm interested in politics, however /r/politics has awful comment quality and isn't a great sub to visit. I'd also like to hear about people's favorite subreddits in terms of comment quality, as I'd happily read a passionate and informative stance on something I'm usually not interested in compared to what I read on /r/politics. Edit: I meant to use it as an example -- I'm actually interested in any type of subreddit…

/r/neutralpolitics - It's not necessarily trying to be completely neutral, but it's trying to be factual and requires sources to be posted.

/r/christianity usually has fairly high quality comments and conversations among Christians and non-Christians.

/r/netsec has high quality posts and comments.

/r/hockeyplayers has a very helpful community but probably not of interest if you're not a hockey player.

/r/goodyearwelt has awesome reviews and information about high quality footwear

/r/malefashionadvice is one of the better run larger subreddits that has writers from major publications that post and comment

/r/askhistorians is very heavily moderated which means a lot of the most interesting questions remain unanswered for a long time, but the answers that are provided are very well thought out and sourced

/r/asksocialscience is similar to /r/askhistorians just different content

Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#199

Post by xienze »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #95
lechiffre10 wrote: post #18

I've significantly reduced my time on Reddit. Used to pull up the website out of curiosity every day but the atmosphere is incredibly toxic. My front page was riddled with Russiagate stuff too for some reason and every time you'd bring up an argument that isn't the norm you get a mob after you.

>Russiagate stuff too for some reason Because its one of, if not, the biggest story in the world right now? I mean, of course its going to occasionally top /r/politics and /r/worldnews. The president and the highest levels of the GOP are directly targeted in an investigation that has brought 20+ indictments with several guilty pleas with apparently more to come. This is a bit like saying the news in 1974 was too focu…

> I mean, of course its going to occasionally top /r/politics

Have you actually ventured over there? Saying Russiagate/Trump stories are "occasionally" at the top of /r/politics is a bit of an understatement. They're obsessed over there.

Re: ‘I Fundamentally Believe That My Time at Reddit Made the World a Worse Place’

#200

Post by GabrielBen »

Synroc wrote: post #9
darepublic wrote: post #5

What I can never reconcile with is that when mainstream media means 'toxic' they are never referring to the /r/latestagecapitalism plastered all over the front page of reddit. They protest the fact that somewhere, hidden from popular view a minority of people hold a different view from the extreme leftist one.

What’s wrong with r/latestagecapitalism?

latestagecapitalism is pretty noticeable. It is an echo-chamber by design, and it is fairly popular.

Its absolute cringe, and it is humbling to me that I dont get why anyone joins such a place.

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