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Why We Shut Down Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’ Forum

nytimes.com

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Re: Why We Shut Down Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’ Forum

#61

Post by embik »

amyjess wrote: post #40
zedpm wrote: post #3

Maybe this will be enough to silence the folks on here who insist that nothing is wrong with Reddit management and that it's just a bunch of angry children complaining without cause. The mods in question are adults and professionals, and they've clearly and succinctly explained their grievances with Reddit management. This piece doesn't touch on some of the other issues that have angered users, particularly the matte…

No, the shutdown of /r/iama was necessary so the moderators could regroup and figure out how to do their scheduling and coördination from now on. The shutdowns of the other subreddits were petulant moves by power mods to treat their users as pawns and hockey pucks. They were punishing their users because they were in a power struggle with the admins. That's wrong . And your claims of censorship are, quite frankly, di…

> The shutdowns of the other subreddits were petulant moves by power mods to treat their users as pawns and hockey pucks. They were punishing their users because they were in a power struggle with the admins. That's wrong.

That's not how I observed the situation honestly. A lot of subreddit mods got flooded with "shut down"-requests and some decided against it, some followed the mass. It wasn't really a hostage-taking, the shutdown has / had widespread support among the user base.

Re: Why We Shut Down Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’ Forum

#62

Post by flatline »

amyjess wrote: post #40
zedpm wrote: post #3

Maybe this will be enough to silence the folks on here who insist that nothing is wrong with Reddit management and that it's just a bunch of angry children complaining without cause. The mods in question are adults and professionals, and they've clearly and succinctly explained their grievances with Reddit management. This piece doesn't touch on some of the other issues that have angered users, particularly the matte…

No, the shutdown of /r/iama was necessary so the moderators could regroup and figure out how to do their scheduling and coördination from now on. The shutdowns of the other subreddits were petulant moves by power mods to treat their users as pawns and hockey pucks. They were punishing their users because they were in a power struggle with the admins. That's wrong . And your claims of censorship are, quite frankly, di…

I laugh when people complain about removal of /r/fatpeoplehate being censorship. The only reason that subreddit was such a problem is because of aggressive moderation and banning of users - i.e. censorship at the moderator level rather than the admin level.

Re: Why We Shut Down Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’ Forum

#63

Post by spodek »

Never surprise your team.

This incident looks like it comes from inexperienced, counterproductive leadership, as do the several incidents leading up to it and that will follow. Or maybe authoritarian. Several days after a firing, people are complaining in the NY Times that they are still surprised.

Not surprising your team is one of the top principles I've learned in teamwork. If, as a manager, your firing someone surprises them or their team, you almost certainly mismanaged the process. If you have a reason for firing someone, you should be able to create a process everyone understands even if they don't agree to it. The people left should certainly not be surprised, especially after the firing.

If your team is surprised by your strategy, if your customers are surprised by your product, and so on, you probably managed poorly. You should only surprise your competition.

At least the rest of us can learn from Reddit's management what not to do: motivating competitors to satisfy their users and customers while they're alienating them.

Re: Why We Shut Down Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’ Forum

#64

Post by twoodfin »

VLM wrote: post #33
twoodfin wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it more likely than not that she was dismissed with good cause? Otherwise, why so abruptly and without explanation from either side? Presumably reddit for legal and other reasons didn't want to kick her on the way out, but what else explains her relative silence?

"but what else explains her relative silence?" Non-disparagement clauses as part of a cash settlement are a thing. This proves nothing but does fit the evidence.

Yeah, but that doesn't explain the abruptness, or reddit's continuing silence. If it was a disagreement over policy or direction, it doesn't seem worth the PR hit not to try to explain it. On the other hand kn0thing's "popcorn" comment suggests it couldn't have been that embarrassing.

Re: Why We Shut Down Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’ Forum

#68

Post by Shivetya »

amyjess wrote: post #40
zedpm wrote: post #3

Maybe this will be enough to silence the folks on here who insist that nothing is wrong with Reddit management and that it's just a bunch of angry children complaining without cause. The mods in question are adults and professionals, and they've clearly and succinctly explained their grievances with Reddit management. This piece doesn't touch on some of the other issues that have angered users, particularly the matte…

No, the shutdown of /r/iama was necessary so the moderators could regroup and figure out how to do their scheduling and coördination from now on. The shutdowns of the other subreddits were petulant moves by power mods to treat their users as pawns and hockey pucks. They were punishing their users because they were in a power struggle with the admins. That's wrong . And your claims of censorship are, quite frankly, di…

I don't know, quite a few users were in full support of the move. The likely ones who were not simply knew nothing of what is going on as a great many users are simply not interested or unable to understand.

It was selective censorship. There are many subs,some quite well known, who are more flagrant than some of the subs shut down. FatPeopleHate was the most famous that was canned and it was likely at the request of IMGUR staff as they were having a pissing contest with content posters. There are quite a few very racists and sexist subs left so this was highly selective. As, a SJW dream hit which many labled the Reddit Wedding.

Personal stories aside, individual posters are who should be banned for violating site rules, not entire subs and certainly not their mods as many of them were trying to enforce rules only to be shot down by reddit admin

Re: Why We Shut Down Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’ Forum

#69

Post by cblades »

paulhauggis wrote: post #11

This article makes it seems like the moderators actually work for Reddit, which isn't the case. This is the problem, actually. Because it's not a paid position, the company can't use that as leverage in situations like this. The moderators essentially have nothing to lose. Even in the article, it states that it was shutdown because of the abrupt termination of Ms. Taylor. Anybody that makes these sort of emotional de…

I think that's very short-sighted. The moderators represent and manage a good portion of the content creators that draw users to reddit.

They shut down AMAs because they were left hanging with several upcoming high-profile guests. The person that had arranged and managed guests in the past was suddenly gone, and there was no communication from Reddit as to what the transition plan was.

Personally, I don't think that's unreasonable at all.

Re: Why We Shut Down Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’ Forum

#70

Post by dgabriel »

VLM wrote: post #33
twoodfin wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it more likely than not that she was dismissed with good cause? Otherwise, why so abruptly and without explanation from either side? Presumably reddit for legal and other reasons didn't want to kick her on the way out, but what else explains her relative silence?

"but what else explains her relative silence?" Non-disparagement clauses as part of a cash settlement are a thing. This proves nothing but does fit the evidence.

Right, "sign this, stay quiet, we'll give you a year's salary." It's hard to turn that kind of an offer down unless you have a lot of money in the bank.
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