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Ask HN: Anyone Building a Competitor to Reddit?

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Re: Ask HN: Anyone Building a Competitor to Reddit?

#131

Post by kiwidrew »

dom96 wrote: post #51

I have come up with a plan that might get a Reddit competitor up and running. I have also started to implement it. Step 1. Create an alternative API for Reddit (I've created an MVP for this here: https://api.reddiw.com ) Step 2. Set up an alternative front-end for Reddit built on top of the alternative API (my plan is to host it at reddiw.com) Step 3. Start implementing a custom back-end, with submissions showing up…

What are your thoughts on handling the authenticated portions of the API? For example, retrieving the list of subreddits a user is currently subscribed to? Or posting a comment / checking the user's inbox?

Re: Ask HN: Anyone Building a Competitor to Reddit?

#132

Post by throw_m239339 »

RhodesianHunter wrote: post #126
throw_m239339 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The point is that as a Reddit user, you won't see that content unless you disable your NSFW filter and go searching for it. The point is that people use reddit to hotlink depraved, illegal porn images and videos and spam these media on other forums. That depraved content is not moderated, it should not be possible to hotlink porn material from reddit. The platform is not moderated like you claim, a checkbox in the…

That's completely tangential to the stated problem though. That sounds like your own personal beef, which as we can see from Reddit would not hamper user growth.

> That's completely tangential to the stated problem though.

No it isn't "tangential", it is what makes reddit a "porn filled shit hole", these are your own words.

> That sounds like your own personal beef, which as we can see from Reddit would not hamper user growth.

Sounds like you have your own personal beef against reddit alternatives when reddit itself is a "porn filled shithole" which you refuse to acknowledge for some reason.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone Building a Competitor to Reddit?

#133

Post by DeltaCoast »

blaise57 wrote: post #124
dimmke wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I think a co op model could be good. I think because we are software engineers, we think some novel technology will fix this issue. But the real problem is that companies take on too much money and are then distorted by it. There has to be a change in software away from VC funding outside of where it’s actually necessary. You don’t need 30 million dollars to build this idea. You could take out a small business lo…

Funny you say this, I incorporated a worker co-op to build a reddit-esque platform with democracy and data-driven tools for communities late last year. Our team is pretty inexperienced, but conceptually and organizationally we've got a lot lined up.

Do you have a link to share? Btw I'm surprised you just made a HN account to share that? Seems kind of suspicious but I don't know why.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone Building a Competitor to Reddit?

#134

Post by dom96 »

kiwidrew wrote: post #131
dom96 wrote: post #51

I have come up with a plan that might get a Reddit competitor up and running. I have also started to implement it. Step 1. Create an alternative API for Reddit (I've created an MVP for this here: https://api.reddiw.com ) Step 2. Set up an alternative front-end for Reddit built on top of the alternative API (my plan is to host it at reddiw.com) Step 3. Start implementing a custom back-end, with submissions showing up…

What are your thoughts on handling the authenticated portions of the API? For example, retrieving the list of subreddits a user is currently subscribed to? Or posting a comment / checking the user's inbox?

My thoughts are: the read-only unathenticated API should cover 80% of the API usage for apps. If there is adoption I will think about the authenticated portions.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone Building a Competitor to Reddit?

#135

Post by max_hammer »

l72 wrote: post #74

I think the problem with Reddit, is it doesn't know what it wants to be. I think for many of us here, we treat it as a forum. We go an find specific subreddits in our interests, and interact with it similar to how we interact with hacker news. Interesting Articles and/or Discussion Questions are posted, and then there is a conversation about it. But that is not how a lot of people use Reddit. To many people, it is so…

So back to BB ?

Re: Ask HN: Anyone Building a Competitor to Reddit?

#136

Post by max_hammer »

dom96 wrote: post #51

I have come up with a plan that might get a Reddit competitor up and running. I have also started to implement it. Step 1. Create an alternative API for Reddit (I've created an MVP for this here: https://api.reddiw.com ) Step 2. Set up an alternative front-end for Reddit built on top of the alternative API (my plan is to host it at reddiw.com) Step 3. Start implementing a custom back-end, with submissions showing up…

This is awesome. How will copyright laws work if you clone UI

Re: Ask HN: Anyone Building a Competitor to Reddit?

#137

Post by ssag2 »

I wish. Reddit jumped the shark years ago but I did look into it at one point. There's a lot of factors you wouldn't anticipate that will trip you up. Not the least of which is quality moderation. Your site will either die under the crush of awful free speech, or live long enough to run out of visitors. It's a tough balance Reddit didn't have to face as harshly in a different time.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone Building a Competitor to Reddit?

#138

Post by ssag2 »

SkipperCat wrote: post #27

My question is why would you want to do that? You're just going to come against the same issues and problems that Reddit has, especially if you want to achieve anything close to Reddit's scale. You'll need staff, money, legal and tech folks (not cheap). And to get the funds, you'll prob have to make the same decisions about ads and API fees. You could pull off something smaller, maybe by being distributed or whatnot,…

>>The killer feature of Reddit is that everyone goes to Reddit because Reddit is Reddit.

The killer feature of Digg is that everyone goes to Digg because Digg is Digg.

FTFY

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