Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round • Hacker News Board

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#401

Post by antonvs » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 4:18 PM UTC

UI_at_80x24 wrote: post #383

mda wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not Google, Internet.

I disagree with this sentiment. The accuracy of Google's search results have gotten worse as time goes on. Once upon a time I could search for a specific system error code and get only results that contained that code. Now however, I am lucky if the search term I am looking for is on the same page, even after I add or try all the Search Modifiers. Yes, the internet has gotten worse. Far more noise then signal. But if…

If you actually include the quotes in your search term, you'll get the results you want, including zero results if there are no exact matches. Either of the following search terms will work:

"Error: 98yuasdvfnbi89yt7"

Error "98yuasdvfnbi89yt7"

In both cases, that search will currently return one page, this one.

https://www.google.com/search?q=Error+%2298yuasdvfnbi89yt7%2...

https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Error%3A+98yuasdvfnbi89yt...

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#402

Post by TheRealDunkirk » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 4:20 PM UTC

romanows wrote: post #324

TheRealDunkirk wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I append "-site:reddit.com" to my programming queries, if it's coming up in results, because it takes multiple clicks in their slow, user-hostile web application to expand the conversation, and there's NEVER an answer there.

That's the new, terrible interface. Replace the "www" with "old" in the URL, like "old.reddit.com". If you create an account, you can configure "old reddit" to be your default. There are also browser add-ons that will rewrite the URLs automatically. The difference is night and day.

Well, like I said, there's NEVER an answer there, so there's no reason to rewrite the URL, or create an account to make it the default.

Given the engineering effort to write the "new" site in such a user-hostile way, the refusal to backpedal on it in the face of overwhelming public negativity, and similar malfeasance on the mobile version, I have a hard time believing that they will keep the "old" version around for much longer.

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#403

Post by DataWorker » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 4:27 PM UTC

Reddit is a net negative for the internet. Facebook isn’t wonderful but at least it’s better for society, and less dishonest to its users than Reddit.

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#404

Post by dharmab » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 4:31 PM UTC

toomanybeersies wrote: post #124

fireattack wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>looking for product recommendations This is the trick I use too; but I found the result still isn't great enough for a few reasons. 1. People seem have a tendency to recommend products/brands that are niche or "in minority". Like some obscure ones that scratch particular itch for that user (and often expensive and hard to find). This is totally fine on its own, but you want to have the big picture (i.e. learn about…

I've found that reddit tends to get pretty cargo culty around particular products/brands, like Sony mirrorless and the Olympus mju II for cameras, Denon DJ equipment, or Starting Strength for weightlifting. So many recommendations basically follow the form "I'm new to this hobby and bought one of these a week ago, I swear it's the best thing ever"

I noticed a cycle with headphones on Reddit:

  - A headphone is released which is not flawless, but offers great value.
  - The headphone is recommended on Reddit.
  - Demand for the headphone goes up.
  - The price of the headphone increases.
  - The headphone is no longer a good value, but is still recommended.
  - This continues until either a well-reputed user points out the poor value or a new headphone with great value is released.

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#405

Post by wilsocr88 » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 4:33 PM UTC

flavius29663 wrote: post #395

wilsocr88 wrote: post #332

Reddit essentially gets users addicted, then surrounds them with what appears to be an environment driven by a kind of democratic consensus (everyone can vote!) but which is actually very tightly curated and edited toward political and social ends. This is so sinister. You don't get that valuable being a popular platform for link-sharing and comments. You get that valuable by wielding an appreciable amount of power o…

I wholeheartedly agree. It's also more addictive than Facebook or Instagram, and (for me at least) it's a more negative mental experience. Probably because of all the dopamine. I don't remember it being like this in the beginning. Not sure if it was because I wasn't hooked on it yet, or because they changed their algorithms. Also, since Trump in 2015, it went even more downhill pretty fast. I am pretty sure they inte…

Anything designed to "increase user engagement" is actually effectively spiking emotions as much as possible. It's a much bigger problem than anyone currently realizes.

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#406

Post by gruez » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 4:44 PM UTC

typon wrote: post #392

juped wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This just works because Google is at a more advanced stage of decay into content farm dystopia than Reddit is.

Up votes make all the difference. They are relatively transparent while Google's PageRank isn't.

That doesn't really matter because both pagerank and upvotes are easily gamed.

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#407

Post by inshadows » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 4:48 PM UTC

paulmendoza wrote: post #93

Stop raising money. Each time you do that you increase the pressure on the site to make more money to earn the valuation. If the company is valued at $6B today then it probably needs to get to at least $18B valuation in two years. How? By trying to extract even more money from the users.

Make people stop wanting money first. ;-)

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#408

Post by steve_adams_86 » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 5:14 PM UTC

toomanybeersies wrote: post #124

fireattack wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>looking for product recommendations This is the trick I use too; but I found the result still isn't great enough for a few reasons. 1. People seem have a tendency to recommend products/brands that are niche or "in minority". Like some obscure ones that scratch particular itch for that user (and often expensive and hard to find). This is totally fine on its own, but you want to have the big picture (i.e. learn about…

I've found that reddit tends to get pretty cargo culty around particular products/brands, like Sony mirrorless and the Olympus mju II for cameras, Denon DJ equipment, or Starting Strength for weightlifting. So many recommendations basically follow the form "I'm new to this hobby and bought one of these a week ago, I swear it's the best thing ever"

Starting strength - absolutely. It’s fine and served me well, but it isn’t the bible of building strength. There are several books worth reading, different schools of thought, but somehow SS always comes out on top on Reddit.

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#409

Post by cwhiz » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 5:17 PM UTC

On the surface, a cesspool dedicated to efficiently, and effortlessly, building and curating your own bubble. Terrible for humanity, and for everyone involved in the "discussions."

Dig deeper, and it's mostly porn.

If you zoom into any random community, it's probably porn. If it's not porn, it's some curated and heavily modded bubble forum for like minded individuals to reinforce what they already believe.

It's unfortunate that Reddit ever added comments, or karma.

Re: Reddit valued at $6B on a $250M round

#410

Post by leereeves » Tue, Feb 09, 2021, 5:22 PM UTC

Kbelicius wrote: post #330

leereeves wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why would you even think that that was a conservative hating comment? The hate in that comment wasn't directed only at Ron: "people like this", "these fucks". The comment doesn't specify who "these fucks" are, but the sub generally directs hate toward conservatives, so that's a reasonable assumption. > because of his behavior and others who behave in that way Others who behave in what way? The post I linked contain…

> The fact that people like this die due to covid and that you have people who "don't care until affects them" is a sad condition in this country and I'm really past playing nice with even the memory of these fucks...... That is the whole sentence of which you quoted a part earlier. That sentence clearly specifies who "these fucks" are. > The post I linked contains only a tweet from him criticizing the hypocrisy of a…

I guess your interpretation is that "these fucks" refers to "people who 'don't care until affects them'"? I didn't read it that way, perhaps because I haven't seen any evidence Ron personally didn't care, and I don't think conservatives in general don't care. I believe they just also care about the business owners going bankrupt, and have more doubts about the effectiveness of lockdowns. (Justified IMO, as the worst death rates to date are in New York and New Jersey, states with Democrat governors and harsh lockdowns, but that's another discussion.)

If that's the correct interpretation, we've found the underlying conservative hate you asked about: the belief that conservatives are evil and don't care about people dying.

And suggesting I'm lying because we have different interpretations is not discussing in good faith.

As to your second point, I'm sure he left out the list because it's far too long to include in a tweet, and getting into all the specifics is too long a discussion for HN comments.

Instead I'll close by asking this: how are gun stores (ordered to close in the lockdown by Governor Newsom) more likely to spread covid than other stores that remain open?