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Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

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Re: Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

#61

Post by SilverBirch »

I think the premise of this is off. Instagram doesn't pay people either. The fascinating and difficult part of reddit's business is that almost the entire value of the platform is controlled by moderators. So if you want to influence reddit users you're better of doing deals with the mods than with reddit itself. Of course, because reddit doesn't have any real relationship with the moderators it's very easy for these mods to go off and do deals with advertisers directly with no oversight. We can probably argue about how often that happens, but there can't really be any doubt that it does happen. It's only when it boils over into public beef that we ever get a real glimpse of it[1]. But you don't have to be a genius to understand that some sub-reddits are just absolutely ripe for advertising - how much do you think it's worth for Uniqlo to be at the top of a fashion guide on /r/malefashionadvice? I'd bet you it's good money.

[1]:https://www.insider.com/wallstreetbets-reddit-bans-moderator...

Re: Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

#62

Post by prvc »

This line of reasoning is founded on a false premise: namely that the moderators who are not financially compensated get nothing out of performing the duties associated with their role. On the contrary, the endless supply of willing volunteers for the task suggests that they do get something significant out of it. I would suggest, to start: ego validation, feelings of personal power, and most importantly the ability to skew discussions in order to support one's desired viewpoint. I would suggest, additionally, that the last listed reason is a significant source of potential bias in moderation, in view of the fact that the value proposition of being a moderator is very appealing to an unrepresentative subset of users of a service. Furthermore the financial value of being able to do this is far greater than a typical paid content moderator wage.

Re: Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

#64

Post by jasonladuke0311 »

nineplay wrote: post #52

I've never quite understood why anyone would want to mod the front page subreddits, r/pics, r/funny, r/askreddit etc. It must be a lot of work and your reward for your efforts you get a non-stop stream of abuse from posters who are either pissed off because you're too lazy and let crap content through or pissed off because you're power-hungry and are only letting through posts that support your own personal agenda.

It attracts people with hall-monitor syndrome. Small people who want to feel powerful and important.

EDIT: I'm sure some are paid to astroturf as well.

Re: Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

#65

Post by hideo »

sweezyjeezy wrote: post #59
engineer_22 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any white collar professional in engineering (full spectrum) has billing rates over $100 at entry level.

Sure, interested to know what deep moderation expertise involves though.

They are not experts in the process of moderation. They are experts in a field and also mod subs in that field.

Re: Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

#66

Post by hideo »

sweezyjeezy wrote: post #43
hideo wrote: post #25

I'd wager this is an extremely low estimate about the value of that labor. From the paper it seems like they compared with freelance moderators on upwork. I'm a part of a couple of super niche subreddits where there are moderators with deep expertise in the area. I know that IRL some of these mods are often billing $100s/hour for their work but on reddit they do it free, and they freely dispense the same advice.

Just curious - what kind of expertise do these people bill that amount of money for?

Without getting into too much detail some of these are software/hardware (e.g. niche libraries and tools used in very specific industries) and some are non tech (maintenance for specific types of vehicles, animal care, etc)

Re: Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

#67

Post by damsta »

matthewowen wrote: post #33

I find the premise of this... bizarre, I guess? Reddit is a site that lets you create your own community about whatever (within some pretty permissive ToS grounds) you want and run it however you want. Why would you get paid for running your own little pet project community? I don't see how it's any more relevant than the labor of all the people posting and voting on content. To be fair it does seem like the group be…

If you create a community that generates ad/gold/whatever revenue for Reddit mods should be able to get at least a bit of it. No communities = no revenue for Reddit.

Re: Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

#68

Post by nineplay »

jasonladuke0311 wrote: post #64
nineplay wrote: post #52

I've never quite understood why anyone would want to mod the front page subreddits, r/pics, r/funny, r/askreddit etc. It must be a lot of work and your reward for your efforts you get a non-stop stream of abuse from posters who are either pissed off because you're too lazy and let crap content through or pissed off because you're power-hungry and are only letting through posts that support your own personal agenda.

It attracts people with hall-monitor syndrome. Small people who want to feel powerful and important. EDIT: I'm sure some are paid to astroturf as well.

That may be true but it's a good example of the kind of negativity they face. I suppose it surprises me how much the front page of reddit relies on either wanna-be hall monitors with egos of steel or paid astroturfers who are officially disallowed and are smart enough to hide their motivations.

It seems fragile. If a few hundred people said f*it, would reddit collapse overnight?

Re: Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

#69

Post by patentatt »

matthewowen wrote: post #33

I find the premise of this... bizarre, I guess? Reddit is a site that lets you create your own community about whatever (within some pretty permissive ToS grounds) you want and run it however you want. Why would you get paid for running your own little pet project community? I don't see how it's any more relevant than the labor of all the people posting and voting on content. To be fair it does seem like the group be…

Maybe for the long-tail, but the largest subreddits are far from pet projects. I am under the impression that being a mod on a sub with millions of subscribers is at least a part time job and it's hard to imagine what Reddit would be like without the largest, most popular subreddits. In those cases, I think the premise of the study seems fair.

Re: Unpaid social media moderators perform labor worth at least $3.4M/year on Reddit

#70

Post by kayodelycaon »

snarkerson wrote: post #49

Porn is built in. Getting rid of it would Tumblrcide. Let's see how that IPO goes. As a rule, all moderators suck. This has been true since before http.

> all moderators suck

Most moderators you notice suck. There are a lot of invisible moderators around quietly removing spam and keeping communities free of griefers.

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