Listen to Steve Huffman tell the story of how Reddit got started • Hacker News Board

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

#21

Post by inkywatcher » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 4:54 PM UTC

grogenaut wrote: post #13

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.

Slack is just irc, Dropbox just nfs, Google just grep, Craigslist just newspaper classifieds, amazon just Walmart, Netflix just charter, hacker news just coffee shops and bars, and on and on, what's your point

When you put it like that, I really prefer some of the precursors.

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

#22

Post by kodah » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 4:58 PM UTC

earthscienceman wrote: post #7

This is a nice time to remind everyone that Aaron Swartz died while fighting for a freer internet and a freer world. He is, by Paul Graham, considered a founder of reddit but is rarely mentioned in these stories. Instead of trying to go for broke and grind till he could cash out, Aaron put his skin in the game for what the internet should become. Which gets more relevant everyday that the internet megacorps consolida…

It'd be nice if they'd stop trying erase Aaron's work on Reddit but that's been underway for some time, and I'm not even really sure why. I can't fathom an end-goal where marginalizing Aaron's contributions is a benefit to them.

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

#23

Post by dang » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 4:59 PM UTC

earthscienceman wrote: post #6

They spammed posts and comments with fake accounts to fake growth until it caught on and then talked about it on HackerNews ...

Could you please stop taking this thread into flamewar?

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35677196.

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

#24

Post by inkywatcher » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 4:59 PM UTC

effingwewt wrote: post #18

jedberg wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol HN didn't exist until reddit was popular. HN was in fact created because reddit go so popular it no longer appealed to PG, so he started HN so he could moderate the conversation himself and steer the community they way he wanted it to go. The other thing you said partly true -- in the beginning the founders had about 100 accounts that they posted with, but there were no comments back then. There was never fake co…

Thats some mighty handwavy mental gymnastics to not call them liars. Pretending to be different people to post qualifies as 'fake posts'. Fake it till you make it, or fraud? Either way it's still bullshit.

While I am very ready to be critical of Reddit, including its creators, community, interface, and aesthetic, I am not personally offended that a couple jabronis posted a bunch of stuff to build up some initial momentum.

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

#25

Post by celtoid » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 5:02 PM UTC

[flagged]

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

#26

Post by nelsonenzo » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 5:03 PM UTC

earthscienceman wrote: post #7

This is a nice time to remind everyone that Aaron Swartz died while fighting for a freer internet and a freer world. He is, by Paul Graham, considered a founder of reddit but is rarely mentioned in these stories. Instead of trying to go for broke and grind till he could cash out, Aaron put his skin in the game for what the internet should become. Which gets more relevant everyday that the internet megacorps consolida…

It's owned by a Chinese company from what I understand. I don't think they have a particular bone with Aaron, but generally just believe in deleting inconvenient controversies.

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

#27

Post by doublerabbit » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 5:04 PM UTC

jedberg wrote: post #16

earthscienceman wrote: post #6

They spammed posts and comments with fake accounts to fake growth until it caught on and then talked about it on HackerNews ...

Lol HN didn't exist until reddit was popular. HN was in fact created because reddit go so popular it no longer appealed to PG, so he started HN so he could moderate the conversation himself and steer the community they way he wanted it to go. The other thing you said partly true -- in the beginning the founders had about 100 accounts that they posted with, but there were no comments back then. There was never fake co…

Digg had it first, Reddit was Digg's second cousin. Reddit never took off until Digg shot itself in the kneecap. Digg was where the "fresh content" came from.

If Digg hadn't made the v2.0 mistake; Reddit wouldn't be where it was now.

The accounts may of not been fake, but reddit for sure had many plants; it was even boasted by the administration team prior Conde Nest. And now it's more blatant than before.

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

#28

Post by turzmo » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 5:08 PM UTC

werid wrote: post #5

this is good timing, as we're witnessing in real time how reddit is ending right now :)

How is that?

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

#29

Post by doodlebugging » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 5:09 PM UTC

https://www.vice.com/en/article/z4444w/how-reddit-got-huge-t...

This is an old article with a similarly themed discussion. I'll have to listen to the pod cast to see whether anything changed in the retelling.

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

#30

Post by mattlondon » Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 5:17 PM UTC

doublerabbit wrote: post #27

jedberg wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol HN didn't exist until reddit was popular. HN was in fact created because reddit go so popular it no longer appealed to PG, so he started HN so he could moderate the conversation himself and steer the community they way he wanted it to go. The other thing you said partly true -- in the beginning the founders had about 100 accounts that they posted with, but there were no comments back then. There was never fake co…

Digg had it first, Reddit was Digg's second cousin. Reddit never took off until Digg shot itself in the kneecap. Digg was where the "fresh content" came from. If Digg hadn't made the v2.0 mistake; Reddit wouldn't be where it was now. The accounts may of not been fake, but reddit for sure had many plants; it was even boasted by the administration team prior Conde Nest. And now it's more blatant than before.

Came here to say this. Reddit was this quaint tiny site that was a breath of fresh air after digg's self-destruction. In those days there were no sub-reddits, just the front page.

I left after sub-reddits started and it went to shit as a result. It has been downhill since then (at least for what I want). HN is much more like what the original Reddit was like. I can imagine that if HN gets "sub" things it will also self-deatruct like Reddit has.