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Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

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Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#601

It amazes me the kind of sheer incompetency their product team has demonstrated over the past 2-3 years. (Edit - as pointed out in replies to this post, this is an unfair characterization fueled by my recent frustrations with the direction the site is going. I don't think it is unreasonable to point out that reddit is failing the expectations of their users, but I don't doubt for a minute that the individuals working…

They've totally broken "quarantined" subreddits as well. I used to occasionally visit /r/watchpeopledie as a reminder of my own mortality and some of the horrors of the world, but apparently NSFW wasn't enough for people visiting "watchpeopledie" to realize they might see something bad. So they "quarantined" it, which actually means totally breaking it, in my browser at least. RIP. Discussion by others here [0] "I'm…

Your point aside, this /r/ falls under: things I didn't know existed but reluctantly clicked on, and clicked on, and clicked on, only to feel a need to DoD 5200.28 wipe it completely from my memory while I stewing in my own vat of nauseating regret.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#602

It amazes me the kind of sheer incompetency their product team has demonstrated over the past 2-3 years. (Edit - as pointed out in replies to this post, this is an unfair characterization fueled by my recent frustrations with the direction the site is going. I don't think it is unreasonable to point out that reddit is failing the expectations of their users, but I don't doubt for a minute that the individuals working…

If nothing else, I think your conclusion that the product team is incompetent (or displays a lot of incompetency) is debatable. That seems very uncharitable. Reddit isn't flush with money the same way Google, Facebook, Amazon and Netflix are. They can't throw wild amounts of cash at a problem to solve it or attract the talent who can. I think your characterization of Reddit's infrastructure challenges - which basical…

>>> Do you know of another website with Reddit's daily active users and revenue profile, but significantly higher availability?

I'd say stack overflow. They're both a relatively simplistic website showing text messages posted by users. Nothing fancy.

Reddit is a simple message board as there were many 15 years ago. They don't host images or video themselves, which avoid the issue of bandwidth. They don't seem to have the breath of analytics and advertising tools offered by google or facebook.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#603

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reddit is still a haven for the far-right. It really leaves a bad taste in my mouth that they are tolerated there.

It is also still a haven for the far-left. Does that leave a bad taste in your mouth too?

Does advocating for single-payer healthcare, free community college, marriage equality, pro-choice, and higher tax rates for wealthy individuals constitute 'far left'? Serious question. I have in mind what I would think of as far left, but I don't see those folks are particularly well represented in the United States.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#604

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reddit is still a haven for the far-right. It really leaves a bad taste in my mouth that they are tolerated there.

Almost everything on Reddit is far-left, or at least anti-Trump. Every front-page sub (e.g. r/pics, which you'd think would be completely non-political) gets bombarded with this spam. You have to actually go looking to find right-wing content, letalone "far-right" content which I haven't come across unless you deem memes to be far-right. Hell, the fact they won't change r/politics to a more accurate name and remove i…

Over 60% of the voting population disagrees with Trump, so by definition that position is not far-anything, it is mainstream.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#605
post #236
post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the 21st century Clippy. "You look like you're trying to do X. Here, let me help you do Y instead."

I'll take issue with that. For all Clippy's interpretation problems (way ahead of their time), it was still trying to facilitate actions that were useful to you (not Microsoft). Dark patterns are defined by trying to willfully get you to do something that's counter to your own intent.

What's the difference, if the result is the same? Do you not think that the employees who write big "use the app!" banners believe they're doing what's best for the user?

As for Clippy, it's not hard to design a straightforward auto-correction feature, which detects what you typed and suggests a useful addition or replacement. Google, Apple, etc., all have their own designs that work perfectly well. I have trouble seeing an animated 3D cartoon as anything other than "trying to willfully get me to do something counter to my own intent". That's a classic way to manipulate people.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#606

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is amazing. While Facebook has reached world domination and died again (spawning an empire and catapulting its owner to be one of the world's richest people), Reddit still seems to be slugging around in the "we have something, maybe we can monetize it idk" phase. While admire that CN is not squeezing them to death, it appears like Reddit is vastly under-managed.

The reddit audience was historically very resistant to advertising. When it began it really wasn't a million miles away from the HN audience, could you imagine the drama we'd have here on HN if suddenly banner ads started appearing? Reddit grew to the point where its audience is now a lot more broad and the previous audience is a vocal minority. They can get away with ramping up ads and other behaviour because the au…

The ads are already happening all over HN. Don't you see the jobs posting for YC companies?

Remember that YC is an investment company. They certainly made billions of dollars through the companies they funded, that were in part thanks to HN.

Every time you send a direct job application to a HN company, that's 20% of your yearly salary staying in the company instead of going to recruiter fees. That's the hell of a revenue per click.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is also still a haven for the far-left. Does that leave a bad taste in your mouth too?

yeah the people who want to redistribute money are equally as scary as the ones who are actively racist

If your comment is not sarcastic, you can go and ask in Eastern Europe if the people who want to "redistribute money" are scary or not.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#608
post #519

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dare I ask what an edgelord is?

It's when you behave online like you are 15 years old. Everything about you has to scream 'enlightened contrarian' or 'devil's advocate' otherwise you'll become one of those conformists clicking their fingers to Taylor Swift and Imagine Dragons. Conversations with them are impossible and frustrating because they aren't looking to talk to someone, they're looking to talk AT someone and collect as many upvotes as possi…

so the entirety of /r/politics?

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#609

It amazes me the kind of sheer incompetency their product team has demonstrated over the past 2-3 years. (Edit - as pointed out in replies to this post, this is an unfair characterization fueled by my recent frustrations with the direction the site is going. I don't think it is unreasonable to point out that reddit is failing the expectations of their users, but I don't doubt for a minute that the individuals working…

They've totally broken "quarantined" subreddits as well. I used to occasionally visit /r/watchpeopledie as a reminder of my own mortality and some of the horrors of the world, but apparently NSFW wasn't enough for people visiting "watchpeopledie" to realize they might see something bad. So they "quarantined" it, which actually means totally breaking it, in my browser at least. RIP. Discussion by others here [0] "I'm…

I haven't visited that subreddit on a long time, so I'm knowing this from you. What a pity. I visited on a similar reason to yours: to know how my own life can be taken suddenly, without notice or warning.

Since I move around exclusively by bicycle, I paid particular attention to the videos where cyclists met their untimely fate. I've learned a lot watching those videos, since it gave me a more clear perspective on how some things, apparently not too extreme, are insanely dangerous traps to a cyclist (riding near a truck with open wheels, for instance, even if at some distance).

Shame it's quarantined...

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#610

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Allow me to send a request parameter “?stfu=Y”

Which breaks on search result and referral traffic, forcing users to install third party extensions to maintain, thus creating new security vectors. Why not just load your own css and set the div to "display:none;" then?

Honestly, that's a good idea. I should block the XPromoPopup class with a content blocker.
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