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Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

nytimes.com

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Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#141

Post by oldmanjay »

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #113
oldmanjay wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The notion of group responsibility for individual actions is insidious, because it's too easy to mount a circular-logic based offense and also because it leads to humanity's favorite game, us v. them.

Humans aren't really individuals, though they labor under the illusion of such. They're weak hiveminds. Individuals, if they exist at all, are rare and want nothing to do with the rest of you. When foreign hiveminds come into contact, one attempts to absorb the other, and failing that, to destroy the other. Memes are highly infectious, and so it's often important to police memes to make sure no foreign ones disrupt t…

That's fairly cynical, and I don't have that experience at all, and I do not agree with you, and I do not know of any evidence backing a single one of your statements.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#142

Post by pkfrank »

ncallaway wrote: post #88
devindotcom wrote: post #38

Maybe I missed it, but was there ever any information on why Victoria was fired, or whether Pao actually had anything (or everything) to do with it? From where I was sitting, it seemed like no one actually learned the full story, which might be confidential or take time to contextualize/safely explain, and everyone immediately threw it on Pao's lap and downvoted any holding maneuvers she and the rest of the staff tri…

It was not made public why Victoria was fired. Neither of the parties are talking about it, so generally it's unknown. The /r/iama mods were not upset that she was fired. They were upset that there was no transition plan in place. > it seems like there was a lot of finger pointing before anyone knew what was actually happening There was finger pointing because nobody knew what was happening. Functions that Victoria w…

This is what many/most have overlooked. Victoria was the straw that broke the camel's back. Her firing was indicative of the lack of appreciation / recognition given to the moderator's, and was just another example of the disconnect and (perceived) exploitation of moderator time/effort without the proper support and tools.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#143

Post by ljk »

DennisP wrote: post #59
Patrick_Devine wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an occasional user of reddit, this whole ordeal has confirmed the reason why I prefer not to hang out in its forums. I have no idea whether Ellen was a capable CEO, but the vitriol which I kept seeing peripherally (through other news articles and here on HN) was absolutely appalling.

It depends on the subreddits. With my subscriptions I barely noticed the whole thing.

Only sub'd in smaller subreddits; didn't know everything was happening until I saw it on hn

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#144

Post by paulhodge »

revelation wrote: post #45
nhf wrote: post #10

I think this was the right thing to do from a PR perspective. Having Steve back as the new CEO will definitely be good for the community. I also applaud Reddit's announcement for calling the community out on their childish BS: > As a closing note, it was sickening to see some of the things redditors wrote about Ellen. [1] The reduction in compassion that happens when we’re all behind computer screens is not good for…

You applaud them on a PR strategy that is akin to dictatorships all over the world denouncing opposition as "terrorists" and criminals? The community is not a coherent block. To give the impression that the criticism stems from an organized group of people that applaud and tolerate death threats is the equivalent of binding it to a strawman and lighting it on fire with gasoline.

Most of the individuals that do death threats are doing it because they think that their peers would approve. The community effect is very powerful and sometimes the community deserves blame.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#145

Post by makomk »

Flammy wrote: post #58
goldfeld wrote: post #11

So can someone summarize the ordeal?

Two major publicly visible actions: 1) Banning of several 'hate' subreddits especially /r/FatPeopleHate for harassment. The harassment was kind of dubious, as while they certainly weren't saying nice things, it didn't seem like they were actively doing 'raids' or doxing. At the same time several significantly worse, but smaller, subreddits remained online (gore, racism, sexism, etc) More info: https://www.reddit.com/…

The harassment thing was not at all dubious: https://archive.is/wP0uB FPH was a nasty cesspit that had been leaking into the rest of Reddit for a while, going into other communities and targeting women who dared to post photos of themselves without meeting their standard of beauty.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#146

Post by magicalist »

ElComradio wrote: post #100

PR that comes out of corporations cannot be trusted. We cannot trust Altman is being honest that he appreciated her efforts. We can't trust that her and her husband were in love. All of this that comes out of spokesmen is carefully crafted as a result of a numbers game. When do we hear "so and so CEO did a horrible job and was forced out by the board."? Never. So are we to believe there is no such thing as a terrible…

> PR that comes out of corporations cannot be trusted

What does this have to do with the parent's post?

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#147

Post by austenallred »

nhf wrote: post #10

I think this was the right thing to do from a PR perspective. Having Steve back as the new CEO will definitely be good for the community. I also applaud Reddit's announcement for calling the community out on their childish BS: > As a closing note, it was sickening to see some of the things redditors wrote about Ellen. [1] The reduction in compassion that happens when we’re all behind computer screens is not good for…

> I think this was the right thing to do from a PR perspective.

I think this was the right thing to do from a product perspective. Pao didn't really know how to use the site, and didn't ever particularly like the users. I don't know if Huffman likes the users, but one would assume that he would at least know how to use the site he helped build :)

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#148

Post by oldmanjay »

justizin wrote: post #118
ElComradio wrote: post #100

PR that comes out of corporations cannot be trusted. We cannot trust Altman is being honest that he appreciated her efforts. We can't trust that her and her husband were in love. All of this that comes out of spokesmen is carefully crafted as a result of a numbers game. When do we hear "so and so CEO did a horrible job and was forced out by the board."? Never. So are we to believe there is no such thing as a terrible…

> Pao does not get a pass on this dynamic for being a woman. It seems like she's been the subject of vitriol primarily for being a woman, since a lot of the vitriol predates the past few days.

As someone who has only watched this popcorn feast, I have the sense that she was the subject of vitriol primarily for taking actions that people didn't like. Many of the insults may well have targeted her gender, but that is not the same thing at all.

I have seen literally no evidence that she was harassed simply for being a woman.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#149

Post by [deleted] »

unchocked wrote: post #41
goldfeld wrote: post #11

So can someone summarize the ordeal?

Ellen Pao has been CEO of Reddit for 8 months. A month or so ago, Reddit banned several subreddits for organized harassment behavior. Since Pao had recently lost a gender discrimination lawsuit, aspects of the reddit community pattern-matched the occurances as "Social Justice Warrioring" and engaged in an organized hate-fest on Pao. About a week ago, Victoria, the admin who coordinated Reddit's "ask me anything" subr…

[deleted]

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#150

Post by Nadya »

dimino wrote: post #126
Patrick_Devine wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an occasional user of reddit, this whole ordeal has confirmed the reason why I prefer not to hang out in its forums. I have no idea whether Ellen was a capable CEO, but the vitriol which I kept seeing peripherally (through other news articles and here on HN) was absolutely appalling.

I came this close to not even knowing about this, until someone posted something in /r/dataisbeautiful about Ellen Pao's comment karma over time. Just like Facebook, it's almost entirely related to what you subscribe to/follow. /r/chess was entirely mum on the situation, for example.

This? https://i.imgur.com/nrYiK5M.png

I find it telling it was negative a majority of the time. Usually "mods" get +1'd just for being mods (common on many forums). It shows, to me at least, that what she said rarely was supported by the community.

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