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Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

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Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#481

Post by taurath »

dexoplex wrote: post #472

Tencent, the giant tech company leading the funding round, owns Wechat and is helping to implement elements of the Chinese Social Credit System. One such recent feature for the program they are trialing is nicknamed the "Deadbeat map". https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-24/new-wechat-app-maps-d...

They also own League of Legends maker Riot Games, have a large stake in Fortnite maker Epic Games, and a rediculous number of services.

They are putting their money literally anywhere there are eyeballs and attention.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#482

Post by ndnxhs »

benbristow wrote: post #249
rhinoceraptor wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do mind them promoting their app, it’s a horrible app and they’ve continually ruined their website. The only way I can stand to use reddit anymore is through Narwhal, at least until they kill their 3rd party apps API.

If their API is killed I think Reddit's done for. I wouldn't use it if I were forced to use the official app myself, sure many others wouldn't either. Folk would probably move over to something like voat.co

There is an alternative made by a previous reddit dev called tildes.net its invite only and quite enjoyable to use. Classic lightweight website and no trolls

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#483

Post by Deimorz »

drankula3 wrote: post #429
Deimorz wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I do wish there was at least one social platform that would try to follow the Craigslist ethos and stay "proudly independent." I worked at reddit for 4 years, but quit in 2016, largely because they were clearly beginning to switch from a small, fairly independent company (despite being owned by Advance/Conde) to one that was going to become completely dependent on venture capital and I knew what that would end up d…

It looks interesting. Your blog says it has "Limited tolerance, especially for assholes." I'd like to ask you a question that would help elucidate this ethos. Let's say a user makes a comment about how illegal immigrants should be deported, and another user calls the first racist in response. How would the site respond & why?

It's impossible to answer questions like that. Depending on a lot of factors, the response could be anything from "do absolutely nothing" to "ban both users".

Community management and moderation aren't simple, black-and-white decisions. Anyone that claims they are has never been involved in doing it at a meaningful level.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#484

Post by rpeden »

GordonS wrote: post #93
minimaxir wrote: post #16

I've been a fan of Reddit for a very long time (as the amount of data science work I've done with their data can attest to), but lately it seems like the incentives between Reddit as a business and Reddit as a community leader are not aligned, and that is a problem. The increasing amount of dark patterns Reddit has been employing lately is concerning. (recent example: Reddit now gates content in mobile Safari to push…

2 things about Reddit's "use our app instead!" buttons: 1. They cycle through a couple of different messages, and the buttons get switched around 2. The wording is such that you read it twice and still aren't sure which button will just take you to the damn website I don't mind them promoting their app, but these dark patterns truely rile me

For now, https://i.reddit.com seems not to have any of the dark patterns.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#485

Post by burfog »

slg wrote: post #325
gfwhuuku wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a reference to a classic Trump tweet: https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/14958910416893952... (Edit to the guy below: I'm not saying I disagree with you, just adding some context.)

The disgusting and disrespectful portions might be a reference, but it was the "Glasses at the end of his nose" line that jumped out as a potential dog whistle. The response with 25 upvotes that talks about Shumer's "sniveling nose" also doesn't help. I know that politicians getting criticized for their looks is just part of the equation and Trump is a big victim of that. However it is a little different when you are…

The antisemitism accusation is completely over-the-top ridiculous. Trump's own daughter is a Jew. Trump moved the embassy to Jerusalem, and not one democrat showed up for the ceremony. There are a couple openly antisemitic members of congress now, Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., and Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn. Louis Farrakhan hasn't even been disowned.

This is a case of projection if there ever was one.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#486

Post by dageshi »

jotm wrote: post #397
ssnistfajen wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the horde of edgelords in WPD totally isn't one of the reasons the sub got quarantined. Gore will always be considered shock content, but the comments in WPD are almost always downright repulsive.

Eh, they went back to Youtube. I've read the vilest, most shocking and dumbest comments on Youtube (and they had quite a few upvotes) - Reddit is meek by comparison.

That's cause to my knowledge you can't downvote on youtube, or rather you can thumbs down but I don't think it has any effects on comments.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#487

Post by moojd »

TheRealDunkirk wrote: post #452
ww520 wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reddit by and large was actively against Trump during 2016 and thereafter.

You must have blocked /r/t_d. I would trust that there would be little argument that, by number of subs, and subscriber count, Reddit leans pretty-heavily left. However, by front page posts, the site APPEARED to lean heavily right in the run-up to the last presidential election. Week after week, I was blown away that the admins didn't nerf the algorithm to "fix" it.

They did eventually nerf the algorithm. /r/t_d was abusing stickied mod posts to get on the front page and that got fixed. I think it was also partly because most of the pro-trump users and posts were concentrated in one subreddit causing inflated upvote counts.

/r/t_d also took advantage of the void left after the DNC primaries ended since the site was very anti-Hillary at the time.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#488

Post by ndnxhs »

eeeeeeeeeeeee wrote: post #364
ethbro wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The browser is a client that works for the user (well, Google, Apple, and Microsoft muddy the waters). The mobile app is a program that works for the developer. The end result of browsers becoming more adtech-hostile and user-friendly is that more companies turn to mobile apps.

I can understand a developer/company wanting to do the app route to regain control (and not having to deal with the annoying inconsistencies/hacks in different browsers/versions), but is ad / tracker blocking really the major driver of going the app route?

Yes, Firefox has been consistently blocking nasty advertiser tricks each release and it supports ad blockers on mobile.

The latest Firefox release has a built in list of tracker domains to block and next release blocks auto playing video.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#489

Post by Zecar »

dangerlibrary wrote: post #436
Zecar wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is hilarious. Yes the reason the subreddit for the President of the USA is allowed to exist is so the FBI can gather evidence.

on Russians, yes.

We're at such a weird area in American politics that I literally cannot tell if you're joking or serious.

Re: Reddit is raising a huge round near a $3B valuation

#490

Post by Deimorz »

e1ven wrote: post #465
qgsrw3fd wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any screenshots of what the website looks like? I'm curious. I'm not asking you to make them just for me, I want to know if they already exist. If they don't and you don't want to make them, that's fine.

There were some at https://imgur.com/c7UWQa9

That screenshot looks pretty bad, since they made the site fairly thin, but not quite thin enough that the sidebar was hidden.

Here's one of the top of my home page right now, in the Solarized Light theme (there are a few other options too): https://i.imgur.com/GbfpnT1.png

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