Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews • Hacker News Board

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#11

Post by raldi » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 9:47 PM UTC

jasonlotito wrote: post #9

leak wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was money the problem before for hiring or the lack of support from the parent company (Conde Nast)? I don't know if they suddenly made more money and as a result were able to hire. Edit: http://blog.reddit.com/2010/11/thank-you-mr-nast-may-we-have...

Unless they are lying, the impression I got was that the issue was money, and that things like Gold Members directly impacted their ability to hire.

In July 2010, some yutz who used to work there said that Conde Nast likes to "allocate resources proportionate to revenue."

http://blog.reddit.com/2010/07/reddit-needs-help.html

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#12

Post by ama » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 9:52 PM UTC

fletchowns wrote: post #5

leak wrote: post #2

That's incredible. Congrats!! :) Are we allowed to ask how/if they're making money?

I'm guessing they are making money (ads & reddit gold) since they have been able to make a few hires recently. Unfortunately the overall quality of content on reddit has really gone downhill. Even after unsubscribing to the subreddits that were the worst offenders, it's really hard to find interesting stuff with meaningful discussions. These days I'm almost embarrassed to tell people I use reddit.

There is few good reddits with good/decent moderation (deleting silly memes and off topic comments, /r/AskScience , /r/fitness and /r/DepthHub/ comes to mind).

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#13

Post by pdenya » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 9:53 PM UTC

tokenadult wrote: post #4

leak wrote: post #2

That's incredible. Congrats!! :) Are we allowed to ask how/if they're making money?

Yes, how many of those eyeball visits produce revenue, and does the company have actual earnings (profits)?

Reddit has sponsored links paid by CPM so all eyeballs account for some revenue. I don't have any info on profit but between the ads, reddit gold and schwag i'd guess they're in the black.

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#14

Post by kmfrk » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 9:54 PM UTC

fletchowns wrote: post #5

leak wrote: post #2

That's incredible. Congrats!! :) Are we allowed to ask how/if they're making money?

I'm guessing they are making money (ads & reddit gold) since they have been able to make a few hires recently. Unfortunately the overall quality of content on reddit has really gone downhill. Even after unsubscribing to the subreddits that were the worst offenders, it's really hard to find interesting stuff with meaningful discussions. These days I'm almost embarrassed to tell people I use reddit.

The reddit admins have made a policy out of basically never intervening on the site - how ever egregious the transgressions are - so the inmates have slowly taken over the asylum.

There's also something to be learnt about this on HN. :)

I think reddit as more of a platform than a community at this point aside from the hivemind and reddit memes going on there. I'm sure it's still an interesting place to create your own subreddit, if you have the time to moderate it (although you can't IP nor e-mail ban people from it).

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#15

Post by kmfrk » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 9:56 PM UTC

patrickod wrote: post #8

fletchowns wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm guessing they are making money (ads & reddit gold) since they have been able to make a few hires recently. Unfortunately the overall quality of content on reddit has really gone downhill. Even after unsubscribing to the subreddits that were the worst offenders, it's really hard to find interesting stuff with meaningful discussions. These days I'm almost embarrassed to tell people I use reddit.

Unfortunately the degradation of community and content is one of the issues that is associated with scale. I personally think reddit has done a much better job at staying off the decline than digg did. I'll be interested to see how things progress as their traffic numbers continue (presumably) to rise.

Is there a consensus about what caused the decline of Digg? I thought it had a lot to do with the redesign that couldn't be reverted, but I don't like to peddle hearsay and assumptions like it's the truth, especially since I never used Digg.

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#16

Post by pdenya » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 9:56 PM UTC

raldi wrote: post #3

To put that in perspective, Flickr is at 1.5B. LinkedIn, 2.7B. Edit: I'd like to go on record with a bet that by the end of the year, reddit will get more traffic than LinkedIn (which currently has a market cap in excess of $6,000,000,000). Anyone want to bet against me? https://plus.google.com/u/1/109191382354704910211/posts/ZRiC...

It wouldn't be surprising, the reddit community is growing quickly and I expect linkedin has a lower pages/visit than reddit.

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#17

Post by jonknee » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 10:01 PM UTC

raldi wrote: post #3

To put that in perspective, Flickr is at 1.5B. LinkedIn, 2.7B. Edit: I'd like to go on record with a bet that by the end of the year, reddit will get more traffic than LinkedIn (which currently has a market cap in excess of $6,000,000,000). Anyone want to bet against me? https://plus.google.com/u/1/109191382354704910211/posts/ZRiC...

LinkedIn's audience/traffic is far more valuable though, so I'm not sure why you added the bit about their market cap. Reddit users by and large are there for entertainment and don't click on ads. LinkedIn's users are there for work and by and large are the ads.

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#18

Post by jasonlotito » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 10:04 PM UTC

raldi wrote: post #11

jasonlotito wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless they are lying, the impression I got was that the issue was money, and that things like Gold Members directly impacted their ability to hire.

In July 2010, some yutz who used to work there said that Conde Nast likes to "allocate resources proportionate to revenue." http://blog.reddit.com/2010/07/reddit-needs-help.html

Exactly my point. The issue was revenue (and, of course, the parent company). But, with more revenue, came more support.

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#19

Post by raldi » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 10:05 PM UTC

jonknee wrote: post #17

raldi wrote: post #3

To put that in perspective, Flickr is at 1.5B. LinkedIn, 2.7B. Edit: I'd like to go on record with a bet that by the end of the year, reddit will get more traffic than LinkedIn (which currently has a market cap in excess of $6,000,000,000). Anyone want to bet against me? https://plus.google.com/u/1/109191382354704910211/posts/ZRiC...

LinkedIn's audience/traffic is far more valuable though, so I'm not sure why you added the bit about their market cap. Reddit users by and large are there for entertainment and don't click on ads. LinkedIn's users are there for work and by and large are the ads.

Reddit doesn't discuss profitability, but note that the Cheezburger Network has been profitable since inception: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1857411

If they can make money off ads, what makes you think reddit can't?

Re: Reddit traffic doubles in less than a year, to 2 billion monthly pageviews

#20

Post by patrickod » Thu, Jan 05, 2012, 10:08 PM UTC

kmfrk wrote: post #15

patrickod wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately the degradation of community and content is one of the issues that is associated with scale. I personally think reddit has done a much better job at staying off the decline than digg did. I'll be interested to see how things progress as their traffic numbers continue (presumably) to rise.

Is there a consensus about what caused the decline of Digg? I thought it had a lot to do with the redesign that couldn't be reverted, but I don't like to peddle hearsay and assumptions like it's the truth, especially since I never used Digg.

IIRC the redesign was the final straw for many users and caused the mass-exodus. I think the functionality of subreddits and the ability to completely ignore the "mainstream content" if you so wish has been the main feature that has helped reddit stop the decline.