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Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

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Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#81

Post by NoMoreNicksLeft »

crazygringo wrote: post #21
debacle wrote: post #13

Reddit has been ripe for disruption for years. It's just waiting on an inflection point and someone to take it behind the barn.

The network effects are too strong. Remember, the only reason Reddit "won" was because Digg destroyed itself with a radical upgrade that everyone hated. Reddit would have to do something similarly self-inflicted, and I can't even guess where people would go. Reddit was already an alternative to Digg -- what's the alternative to Reddit? I mean, it's certainly not Quora.

It was already dead by then. Really, it was the various Slashdot exoduses... sites like K5 got large initial boosts, but stumbled and started to deteriorate. If the Digg exodus is what sent you to Slashdot, chances are you're the kind of user everyone else was trying to escape.

>what's the alternative to Reddit? I mean, it's certainly not Quora.

If it was deliberate I certainly can't tell, but one of the characteristics of Reddit is that it caused so many other little tiny internet forums to just wither away. Most were visually unappealing, running some ancient phpbb software or whatever, but there were so many like stars in the night sky. Now, if they're even still running, you look for the newest post, and it will say "November 2023". Hell, the only reason they are still running is that the credit card number on file paying for hosting doesn't expire until next year somehow. Reddit is a red tide algae choking out all life in the ocean, nothing else gets to exist anymore.

Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#82

Post by brewdad »

Hikikomori wrote: post #17
VoidWhisperer wrote: post #2

Wow, reddit found a way to make themselves even less useful somehow. After the API fiasco, that seemed like it'd be pretty hard to do.

The only things it does for me is forcing me to use Google as a large amount of the answers I need is on reddit.

So then this gambit worked. It sucks and I hate it. I will continue to use DDG/Bing first but it looks like I'll be hitting up Google more often too.

Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#83

Post by em-bee »

semiquaver wrote: post #62
tempfile wrote: post #51

Hopefully this paves the way for antitrust action, but I won't hold my breath. Reddit's justification for this is profoundly wrong. Their "public content policy" is absurd doublespeak, and counter to everything the open internet is and hopes to be. You cannot simultaneously call yourself "open" and "public" while refusing access to automated clients. Every client is automated. They even go so far as to say that "craw…

Sorry, what is the antitrust concern about Reddit blocking crawlers that aren’t paying them? Surely you don’t think Reddit has a monopoly on anything? Or are you somehow suggesting that it’s google’s fault that Reddit took this step? I don’t see any indication that’s the case.

not that reddit has a monopoly, but that google has.

google is using their power to prevent others from competing.

the problem here is of course that if reddit would be in financial trouble (i don't know if they are but let's imagine they need this money), they'd be between a rock and a hard place.

google should not be allowed to make exclusive deals, and reddit could not survive without the deal, then what would be left? google buys reddit, or the relevant authority approves of the deal?

i thought about the same problem with firefox. let's assume firefox is forced to allow people to make a choice of the default search engine (just like microsoft was forced to allow a choice of default browser on windows) then google might stop paying mozilla, and they could end up in financial trouble.

ideally no company ever depends on a single other company that much, but that only works if we don't allow companies to grow that much in the first place.

Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#84

Post by ToucanLoucan »

kjkjadksj wrote: post #63
ToucanLoucan wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We did. As in we, the Internet, existed for a long time without anyone making money and we paid for the privilege. Websites were built and hosted at owner's expense, for years, with no expectation that they be financially rewarded. Sure some would run donation drives, or work with sponsors relevant to the community in question, but a whole ton, mine included, just cost me a lot of money over many years. Those website…

Part of the issue is that it isn’t just the web, but the inevitable american corporate shareholder model. Even businesses could be mom and pop ified and made way more popular overnight: quit raising prices and cutting corners and it would actually stand for itself like a massive $7 burrito. However the expectation is that shareholders get returns. Costs must be cut. Prices must be raised. Margins must be improved. It…

My rant above and your response reminded me of all those tons of MMO games out there that are ancient, with a tiny playerbase, that remain profitable nonetheless simply because if you have a product that people like using, putting it into maintenance mode and doing the bare minimum to keep it running is a perfectly valid business strategy. The companies that buy these service games and run them effectively just buy completed money printers and keep them operating. It's not going to make anyone rich probably, but it's a perfectly valid and profitable way to go about things.

The silicon valley "grow at all costs, always evolve and innovate forever" model is so detached from the reality of most businesses in my experience.

Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#85

Post by VancouverMan »

bdjsiqoocwk wrote: post #47
PaulRobinson wrote: post #31

This is great. It means I won't see Reddit content popping up all over search results in other engines. Can Medium do the same? And perhaps Quora?

What a weird thing to say. Reddit has for a long time been a place where real people hang out and have real conversations, unlike quora and medium.

> where real people hang out and have real conversations

I don't consider the discussions there to be "real" in any meaningful way, thanks to the extensive moderation.

From what I've seen, there typically ends up being a small handful of moderator-enforced narratives that are deemed "acceptable" for a given subreddit, and any commenters deviating from those narratives get banned, or their comments end up as "[removed]" by "[deleted]", or the comments get obscured with the "comment score below threshold" notice.

It's generally some of the most one-sided and blandest discussion around. Given that there's often no meaningful back-and-forth involving differing perspectives of any sort, I'm not even sure if it should be considered "discussion". It's more like regurgitation and repetition.

I've found the situation to be particularly bad on the Canadian locale-specific subreddits, for example, but a enough of the tech-oriented ones I've seen seem to end up like that, too.

Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#86

Post by roughly »

Boy, the LLMs have really been an apocalypse moment for the web, haven’t they? Between hoovering up and monetizing every bit of content they can without any attribution or compensation and the absolute flood of mediocre generated content, they’ve really done in the last straggling remains of the open internet.

It’s not like everyone wasn’t already pulling the same grift, but quantity really does have a quality all its own.

Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#87

Post by LunaSea »

wvenable wrote: post #12
VoidWhisperer wrote: post #2

Wow, reddit found a way to make themselves even less useful somehow. After the API fiasco, that seemed like it'd be pretty hard to do.

But, apparently, they did finally find a way to make money.

Barely enough to pay the CEO

Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#88

Post by NoMoreNicksLeft »

voisin wrote: post #67

Makes sense that Google did this deal since their search quality tanked and they became an de facto front end UI for Reddit.

Up until 2016 (I think, +/- 1 year), if you could remember 3 uncommon words in a comment, you could find any reddit post instantly on Google. I'd want to follow up on a thread from weeks ago, and it was magic. Number one result. Then one day that just stopped working, and even adding site:*.reddit.com didn't fix it. At the time, I think, I didn't realize that it was mostly Google's fault, I thought maybe Reddit had changed their infrastructure so that it couldn't be crawled properly.

Google hasn't been a search engine in a long while, it's just an advertisement engine now.

Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#89

Post by wccrawford »

Ylpertnodi wrote: post #16
lifestyleguru wrote: post #10

I deeply regret every minute spent on and kilobyte of text contributed to reddit.

I don't. There's nothing around that is similar...with the same traction. The various 'verses are variations on cat pics. I'm still looking, though.

While it's still not Reddit, but I've been enjoying Lemmy. I have a similar range of communities on each, and other than some annoying groupthink, the content is often similar.

And to me, forgetting to log in to each of them feels similar, too. For what that's worth. (I hate both of them when not logged in.)

Re: Google is the only search engine that works on Reddit now, thanks to AI deal

#90

Post by chippiewill »

immibis wrote: post #78
popcalc wrote: post #5

# Welcome to Reddit's robots.txt # Reddit believes in an open internet, but not the misuse of public content. # See https://support.reddithelp.com/hc/en-us/articles/26410290525844-Public-Content-Policy Reddit's Public Content Policy for access and use restrictions to Reddit content. # See https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit4researchers/ for details on how Reddit continues to support research and non-commercial use. # pol…

Nobody who wants to be successful obeys robots.txt. And I do mean nobody.

They changed it to disallow so that scrapers can't just claim the robots.txt gave them permission.
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