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Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

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Re: Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

#531

Post by seydor »

buildbot wrote: post #156
p-e-w wrote: post #50

The stickied comment stating that "this contradicts standing policies" is amusing. As if Reddit was somehow contractually bound to abide by random rules that they themselves made up, on their own site. It's astonishing how many people don't seem to understand what it means to be a user today. Especially if you're not paying, but even if you are.

Comments like these are really.... something. It's basically boiling down to don't you plebes know we can smash you like insects whenever we want? Now go enjoy your trickles of piss. People are protesting because they do understand, and they don't like it, and they will probably leave.

I am willing to bet a lot of money that reddit is not losing users out of this, it is gaining

Re: Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

#532

Post by marginalia_nu »

Panzer04 wrote: post #354
goykasi wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Im not a fan of how reddit is handling the situation, but: > To push an app no-one ever liked, you know that, but whatever. No-one likes “new” Reddit either, you know that, but whatever. Who’s even gonna use the site after this? Is just not true at all unless you have actual stats to back that up. A ton of people disagree with that take. The site has grown a massive amount since the new design was released in 2018. S…

"Core" user base != tyranny of the majority. Alienating a huge amount of clearly passionate reddit users in favour of Joe schmoe browsing on the train home sounds like a dangerous decision - reddit sti needs all those people who provide the content people browse for, etc. In any case, at this point the bigger issue for a lot of people is just the total disrespect reddit has publicly announced, repeatedly, towards its…

I think it's also worth noting that the actual contributing members on message boards is a tiny minority[1][2][3]. Activity appears to follow a Pareto distribution. The members that not only contribute, but regularly contribute quality content is a minority within that minority.

The vast majority is scrolling and blowing air out their nose, maybe voting, maybe very occasionally leaving a comment. From a monetization sense, it may look tempting to focus on retaining that passive minority, but what risks happening is a dead sea effect where it enters a cycle of contributors leaving because contributions are deteriorating in quality. That can be nearly impossible to reverse.

[1] https://jennchen.com/blog/business/were-all-lurkers/

[2] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/222436334_The_Top_F...

[3] https://publikationen.bibliothek.kit.edu/1000129213/10112828...

Re: Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

#534

Post by wnkrshm »

makeitdouble wrote: post #24
KingOfCoders wrote: post #16

If you don't pay for it, it's not your community. Again and again people think they get something for free, which they don't. If it's free you're a volunteer for the company, if you pay you're a customer.

Additionally if you pay for it you're a customer, and it's still not your community, you still accepted a contract that probably allows the company to do pretty much anything, and they can pull the rug at any point.

If you pay, your data set is just worth more (Edit: to the company), since it proves you have money and can be made to spend it.

Re: Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

#535

Post by comprev »

spazx wrote: post #109

Smelled this one coming miles away. Next, they'll hand over fan-built communities to the entities that own the IPs they're dedicated to. Eg. r/starwars to Disney, r/startrek to Viacom/Paramount, etc. Then, old.reddit.com will stop working spontaneously, just like how they toyed with killing mobile browser access to force users to download the app, which they probably will eventually. That's going to be the final push…

The selling off of communities _dedicated_ to IP (Disney is an excellent example you give) is a genius move imho, and perhaps was part of the strategy for going IPO. Not only does Reddit slurp up more user data via official Apps, they have revenue from the IP owners.

They have the deep pockets to employ mods to keep the place clean, especially now 3rd party Mod tools are permitted - it's just the direct user-experience tools/apps which are kicked out.

I would bet the _vast_ majority of consumers don't really care about the blackouts/API changes. They just want to catch up on the latest F1 news, recent movie trailers or whatever their hobby.

Re: Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

#536

Post by goatlover »

photonerd wrote: post #244
olalonde wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook and Twitter are not bot ridden ghost towns... but anyways, I'll make the opposite prediction: Reddit is going to turn out just fine and this episode will quickly become a memory from the past.

Twitter absolutely is. If it’s not bots, article spam, or ads, it’s the crazy MAGA-crowd jerking themselves off over their fake-outrage of the moment. It’s an absolute ghost town in terms of engaging, original, content. Their user numbers are obviously buoyed by absolute junk accounts and it’s been obviously so since Musk fired most of the company. FB is a boomer & genX meme-pocalypse that’s absolutely slathered with…

What do you think the major politics and news subs are on Reddit? Or is it only bot-ridden, ideological fake-outrage when it's right wing?

Re: Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

#537

Post by jtode »

RWSen wrote: post #526
golergka wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes. Those are the very people who should be never ever allowed to become mods, or to be anywhere near any position of power. Who do you think the existing mods are?

> Who do you think the existing mods are? I am. I moderate my local city subreddit. All I do is remove surveys and point people seeking housing to the megathread. (We're a university town, so lots of students seek people willing to fill in badly designed questionaires.) Yes, the biggest subreddits will always have a number of power tripping mods. But the vast majority of subreddits have a stable mod team putting in a…

I keep seeing this ubercynical take that "mods are all on a power trip" from people who are clearly planning to invest in the IPO. Normally this forum has a lot of nuanced thought but on this one I'm seeing a lot of VC groupthink happening.

No matter how you try to fashion your logic, Reddit was a community effort, done in good faith by many volunteers, and it really was the last of the platforms with any sort of legitimacy because of that, and that is now gone for good.

Do people learn the lesson about trusting capital? We'll see.

Re: Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

#538

Post by irthomasthomas »

spazx wrote: post #109

Smelled this one coming miles away. Next, they'll hand over fan-built communities to the entities that own the IPs they're dedicated to. Eg. r/starwars to Disney, r/startrek to Viacom/Paramount, etc. Then, old.reddit.com will stop working spontaneously, just like how they toyed with killing mobile browser access to force users to download the app, which they probably will eventually. That's going to be the final push…

According to this admin they will use rules 4 (inactive moderation) and 2 (vandalism) to drive out the mods. https://np.reddit.com/r/ModSupport/comments/14a5lz5/mod_code...

Therefore, if mods want to retain their position, they need to poll their users for support, and then reopen the sub in a very limited capacity that continues the spirit of the protest while obeying the rules. I.e. mods are free to run the subs as they like, so they could limit posting to users with > X karma, or > Y account age. As long as the community agrees, it can't be considered vandalism.

Re: Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

#539

Post by Spoom »

TheDong wrote: post #365
kitd wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The threshold for free API usage for modding tools is being increased from 60 to 100 queries per minute https://mods.reddithelp.com/hc/en-us/articles/16693988535309 There are a very small minority that exceed that even now apparently. Seems not unreasonable to me.

The threshold is being increased from 60 to 100 for bots which didn't delegate auth, but not for any tools that used specific user-ids. It's misleading. To quote from reddit's docs: https://support.reddithelp.com/hc/en-us/articles/16160319875... > Important note: Historically, our rate limit response headers indicated counts by client id/user id combination. These headers will update to reflect this new policy based…

Yup. I mod with RIF very frequently and will likely be done when it's gone.

Re: Reddit is removing moderators that protest by taking their communities private

#540

Post by wnkrshm »

radar1310 wrote: post #428

This reminds of a a bunch of 12 year olds in a school yard taking their ball and going home. The maturity level of this CEO is shocking. And aome of the moderators can’t be much older than 12 in the way they have acted. So unprofessional and so unnecessary.

Your analogy isn't complete.

The analogy is more like: 12 year olds playing a soccer tournament that draws a crowd and the people owning the yard are selling drinks and showing ads.

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