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Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

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Re: Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

#141

Post by htag »

bigcloud1299 wrote: post #4

Most of social platforms are nothing but feature AOL back in the day. They got a different look and feel. Some are cross over of ICQ and AOL (WhatsApp) AOL messenger Chat rooms (discord, telegram) Twitter is nothing but public chat room.

Generally the social platforms can offer one or more of these three things better than AOL ever did.

1. Recommendation engines, and other clever ways to drive up engagements.

2. Marketing. AOL's marketing was generally ahead of other tech companies at the time. Modern platforms have marketing on par with any other consumer brand. They are specifically great at FOMO, user acquisition, and feeling like a basic utility for modern life.

3. Network effect. Meta reports almost 3B monthly active users. What did AOL max out at? 20M?

Re: Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

#143

Post by benatkin »

jefftk wrote: post #139
benatkin wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people have to listen to a podcast to hear them present a balanced view, clearly they've failed to do so publicly. I'll pass on listening to the podcast, there are thousands of others I'd rather listen to. Thanks anyways.

> > If you listened to the podcast they talked... > If people have to listen to a podcast to hear... birken wasn't saying that this information is only in a podcast, he's talking about a podcast because that's the article we're discussing.

I just noticed jl posted it!

Re: Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

#144

Post by bloopernova »

mandmandam wrote: post #142

Steve Huffman, aka 'spez'? Wasn't he the guy who got caught anonymously rewriting user comments? Secretly editing user comments, without a trace. As CEO. ... Seems weird that this hasn't been brought up yet - maybe it was covered in the podcast?

Yep, that was him. He had an admin login to their prod database.

Honestly wish that signing comments was supported in more forums/aggregators. I know I can do it manually but I want verification built into the site.

Re: Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

#145

Post by LegitShady »

local_crmdgeon wrote: post #140
LegitShady wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

but lets say they're upset enough to leave - where will they go en masse that replaces reddit?

TikTok is eating the world. It's already completely consumed instagram.

tiktok does not fulfill the same role reddit does. People can already choose to go on tiktok if they want - it doesn't replace reddit in any way.

Re: Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

#146

Post by faeriechangling »

jacquesm wrote: post #127
faeriechangling wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've felt for a decade now, even though the two weren't directly linked, that the death of Aaron Schwartz was the symbolic death of Reddit's soul. Nowadays the website is a dark pattern hellscape that forces app downloads for "age verification" and just because you scrolled through too many comments. Schwartz is dead and Ohanian is a multi-millionaire married to an olympian, so I guess that tells you about what socie…

Swartz. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Swartz

I must be watching too much Spaceballs

Re: Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

#147

Post by satvikpendem »

notatoad wrote: post #108
tough wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny both Alexis is a VC now, and he actually invested in kevin's NFT 10k PFP (Moonbrids) The Reddit Mafia

reddit basically became everything the founders mocked when they first started it. https://sp.reddit.com/reddit2.html

Well, this happens for every service over time, as companies decide to put profit over their users: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/enshittification

Re: Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

#148

Post by mandmandam »

bloopernova wrote: post #144
mandmandam wrote: post #142

Steve Huffman, aka 'spez'? Wasn't he the guy who got caught anonymously rewriting user comments? Secretly editing user comments, without a trace. As CEO. ... Seems weird that this hasn't been brought up yet - maybe it was covered in the podcast?

Yep, that was him. He had an admin login to their prod database. Honestly wish that signing comments was supported in more forums/aggregators. I know I can do it manually but I want verification built into the site.

Huffman also seems to be the guy who edited a list of co-founders to remove Aaron Swarz. [0]

He also said - after Swarz's death - that Swarz wasn't a co-founder. 'Unpersoned', I think is the correct term for such as this.

So... I'm left wondering why anyone is listening to this guy. Especially on a subject where he has been caught lying and rewriting history multiple times.

0 - https://web.archive.org/web/20201005184849/https://www.reddi... - Archive link necessary as the original has a deleted user, a deleted post, and many deleted comments. In fact, the entire sub (watchRedditDie) was ended, partly because Huffman reneged on a promise to reinstate Swarz on the founders list [1].

1 - https://www.reddit.com/r/WatchRedditDie/comments/vd2wj8/were...

Re: Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

#149

Post by primax »

noir_lord wrote: post #79
twostorytower wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know some people at Reddit and sadly it's definitely going to happen.

Used Reddit for 14 years as a registered member and longer since before I signed up. The day old.reddit.com stops working is the day I stop using reddit completely, I detest their new UI so much that it’s essentially unusable for me.

100% agreed, it is absolutely awful.

They learned nothing from the Digg apocalypse.

Re: Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started

#150

Post by primax »

ROTMetro wrote: post #113
hayst4ck wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the day I will quit reddit and never look back. 6 months ago I rarely used old.reddit.com, but now I run into more and more dark patterns all the time. They tried to TikTok my feed and it was an awful experience. I frequently default to it now instead of using it only when I get sick of the dark patterns. Reddit got popular because Digg screwed up their comment threading. It's sad to see reddit is starting to…

The entire Internet at the 'fantastic' time of Reddit was very much tilted towards the elite class that could 1. Afford an expensive computer or phone (or have access from University) 2. Afford Internet (and for an added bump of exclusivity add mobile Internet) (or have access from University) 3. Have the time/inclination to put lots of energy into CREATING Internet content (via either a hobby site, or composing well…

Unapologetically yes, this is what I want.

You can call it classist all you want but I want the ivory tower, not the swamp.

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