So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe • Hacker News Board

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#541

Post by ndriscoll » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:02 PM UTC

graemep wrote: post #518

b112 wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cost a lot to operate? apt-get install forum-software. All security updates with apt-get updates. Use something like Debian, and you keep the same forum software for years with zero config changes, but with security updates. I know endless local groups. Bike clubs. Hobby groups. They still all run on forums and mailing lists. No ads. No tracking. No doom-scrolling or this and that. Cost? For many of them, a $5/month…

They are cheap to operate now. This is something governments and big tech will fix. As I said in another comment they are no longer as cheap to operate in the UK because of regulatory requirements, and this sort of regulation tends to get copied and extended around the world. All for the sake of the children, of course. How much will it cost with UGC requires age verification and round the clock moderation? When its…

Local bike clubs and hobby groups presumably know their members, so age verification and moderation aren't issues. Despite computers theoretically being able to connect to anyone in the world, you don't have to use them that way.

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#542

Post by vovavili » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:06 PM UTC

tdeck wrote: post #536

I always wondered how Reddit justified the old.reddit effect. If your new design is so awful that a large percentage of users refuse to use it, and prefer the (more performant!) version from more than a decade ago, shouldn't that be a strong signal that you've made some mistakes? Why not try making the new version more appealing by investigating and fixing the issues that cause people to use the old one. I guess cred…

Reddit redesign strikes me as a convenient excuse to enforce infinite scrolling by a company looking to IPO.

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#543

Post by realusername » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:09 PM UTC

egorfine wrote: post #440

As a heavy reddit user since the glorious Digg times... what's up with this "old reddit" thing? I vaguely remember some problems with new reddit initially. But the "new" frontend looks nice to me in all aspects. What am I missing?

The new frontend still doesn't have a proper zoom implementation so I can't use it

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#544

Post by asddubs » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:09 PM UTC

tdeck wrote: post #536

I always wondered how Reddit justified the old.reddit effect. If your new design is so awful that a large percentage of users refuse to use it, and prefer the (more performant!) version from more than a decade ago, shouldn't that be a strong signal that you've made some mistakes? Why not try making the new version more appealing by investigating and fixing the issues that cause people to use the old one. I guess cred…

While I do use old.reddit and genuinely think it's better UI-wise, in the general case users tend to be resistant to any UI change because it breaks their habits and muscle memory. This is valid but applies even if the new design is easier to use/better in one way or another.

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#545

Post by graemep » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:10 PM UTC

mothballed wrote: post #528

graemep wrote: post #518

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are cheap to operate now. This is something governments and big tech will fix. As I said in another comment they are no longer as cheap to operate in the UK because of regulatory requirements, and this sort of regulation tends to get copied and extended around the world. All for the sake of the children, of course. How much will it cost with UGC requires age verification and round the clock moderation? When its…

Someone is always hungry and willing to ignore international norms for a greenback. Vanuatu will sell citizenship to any hoodwinking criminal for a paltry sum. Comoros will sell internet "gaming licenses" to any money launderer with some change rolling around. Some other shithole island will happily not pass the law so that whatever warlord is in charge can buy enough coconuts for the plebs not to overthrow him, by s…

Those thing will be priced to be affordable by the right, not normal people.

Selling pirate services will not solve the problem for someone running something like a community forum for their area, or a national forum for their hobby, or similar. You are still within the reach of your own country.

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#546

Post by bakies » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:12 PM UTC

red-iron-pine wrote: post #143

benjiro29 wrote: post #84

As somebody who did plenty of scraping for his own little projects, lets just say that reddit their security concerns are just PR for "we do not want to keep supporting old.reddit". While yes, you can not simply scrap new reddit as easily as a pure html scraper is cheaper to run. And while the new reddit its js "slow down" scraping as it need to run over a headless browser. Do you slow scraping down a lot? No. Becaus…

> "we do not want to keep supporting old.reddit" the second old.reddit goes is the second I stop using that site it's already very obviously chock full of slop and AI bullshit, with some subs having long unavoidable lists of "your post was removed because you did not verify" trails that imply that automated posters found a thread and went hard but add in privacy crushing bs -- no reason to be there anymore. Back to o…

I've almost stopped using it because 3rd party apps finally died a couple months ago. Old.reddit isnt too ergonomic on mobile and new is just awful. Seems like a lot of that sentiment here, they might just kill a big part of their userbase before IPO!

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#547

Post by graemep » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:12 PM UTC

ndriscoll wrote: post #541

graemep wrote: post #518

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are cheap to operate now. This is something governments and big tech will fix. As I said in another comment they are no longer as cheap to operate in the UK because of regulatory requirements, and this sort of regulation tends to get copied and extended around the world. All for the sake of the children, of course. How much will it cost with UGC requires age verification and round the clock moderation? When its…

Local bike clubs and hobby groups presumably know their members, so age verification and moderation aren't issues. Despite computers theoretically being able to connect to anyone in the world, you don't have to use them that way.

Its fine for some groups, but its extra work (you cannot just let people sign up, the admins will have to add each user individually) and for many things you want people to join. A very local hobby group might be OK, but anything broader is a problem. A hobby group for a city? A community forum for a village?

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#548

Post by walt_grata » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:13 PM UTC

vovavili wrote: post #542

tdeck wrote: post #536

I always wondered how Reddit justified the old.reddit effect. If your new design is so awful that a large percentage of users refuse to use it, and prefer the (more performant!) version from more than a decade ago, shouldn't that be a strong signal that you've made some mistakes? Why not try making the new version more appealing by investigating and fixing the issues that cause people to use the old one. I guess cred…

Reddit redesign strikes me as a convenient excuse to enforce infinite scrolling by a company looking to IPO.

I read it as management only knows how to evaluate and reward change even if its just for the sake of the promotion process

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#549

Post by bakies » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:13 PM UTC

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #457

chuckadams wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never used to be an old.reddit die-hard, but new got so bad it chased me there to where I now use a browser extension to redirect all reddit links to old. I was convinced that the website continued to get worse so they could steer you into the app which hoovers up all your personal information. But then the app is so godawful unusable that I think we're just looking at straight-up incompetence. So yeah, I'm in the…

So, is it back to Digg, circle around to Slashdot, or is there a new kid on the block?

I'm mostly just here now... More forums for other stuff would be nice though.

Re: So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe

#550

Post by forestingfisher » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 12:17 PM UTC

junon wrote: post #504

You're not a fringe user, a ton of people use old reddit (myself included). They're killing themselves the same way Tumblr did. Oh well.

I doubt Reddit will die anytime soon, at least not within the next 5 years. They have an incredibly lucrative AI deal with Google, and their activity has skyrocketed over the last couple of years. The average person who just wants to fix their car doesn’t care about Old Reddit, the poor moderation, the spam filters, the slow website, or the removal of r/all. Most people are already used to modern web design anyway. What Reddit has is an active userbase and a huge amount of answers, and for now, that is what keeps them successful.