hey everyone. if you want to post links or discuss the Reddit blackout, its aftermath, and what’s happening going forward, please localize it to this thread in order to keep things tidy! thanks! we’ll see if we need to cycle the thread again before the end of this week, but i don’t know that we’ll need to
Redditinc.com’s fact(oid)s about the API changes.
Includes such BS as
100,000+ active communities
Technically true. But it’s estimated that between 1/3 and 1/2 are NSFW. That is, the subs they don’t want shown at their (mythical) IPO.
Supporting these apps is not free for Reddit; they incur both infrastructure and significant opportunity costs.
Technically true. But so does the official app, and web browsers. API calls are not some sort of special magic that causes extra wear on the systems. If the users never had the third party apps they’d be using something else, causing the same traffic and usage - or using nothing at all.
Reddit needs to be a self-sustaining business and to do that, we can no longer subsidize commercial entities that require large-scale data use from our API.
Again, third party apps are no more of a drain on data use than anything else. It’s been proven, but Spez keeps pushing this lie.
Many other platforms have chosen to stop supporting apps like these altogether.
Objection! Facts not in evidence.
more than 98% of apps do not pay and will continue to access the Data API for free so long as apps are not monetized […].
Emphasis mine. This is the real story.
Our pricing is based on usage levels comparable to our own costs
Either this is an outright lie or Spez is admitting that the official Reddit app is an inefficient, data monching, piece of garbage.
We’re working to improve the mobile mod experience
Spez has been promising rainbows for years but all we ever get is poop. Or just the smell of poop. That the mobile apps were released without proper moderator tools tells you what he thinks of moderators.
We have a unique system of checks and balances, and we respect the communities right to protest.
Clearly a lie, given that Spez is going to change the rules to force out moderators who choose to follow their sub’s wishes to protest.
r/nottheonion is asking users to vote, including a fun option that encourages people to take Tuesdays off
The “fun option” is an official means of joining the protest. Can he stop lying for 10 seconds?
We conducted an accessibility audit with an external consultant and have been working on improving accessibility on the site and in our apps.
Yes, much smarter than actually TALKING TO YOUR OWN USERS AND SEEING WHAT THEY WANT. Oh, they want what you refuse to do? Gee, what a surprise!
Nothing says ableism more than telling people with disabilities that they have no agency in how or if they get accommodations. (Sadly, the ADA does not apply to Reddit as a website.)
In summary, Spez needs to be fired. Preferably out of a cannon, into the sun. (Edit to add, because I am newbie here: This is hyperbole. I do not actually advocate violence against anyone.)
Yes, but if you fire a spez from a canon into the sun, but no one can see him enter the sun, then does he actually get harmed? No one knows, especially if he never returns!
Do it at night, show some mercy.
at midnight. as is tradition.
So spez is the narwhal who gets his bacon cooked. The prophecy’s revelation has come to pass!
What about in winter, when the sun isn’t as hot?
Could you elaborate on how and why the ADA doesn’t apply to Reddit as a website? I’ve been wondering about this ever since Spez admitted the official app isn’t accessible and they seemingly have no plans to make it so.
The ADA only requires accessibility in websites if it’s a government site, or if it’s the site of a company providing a “public service,” such as a bank or a hotel.
Here’s the ada.gov page about it: https://www.ada.gov/resources/web-guidance/
undefined> Technically true. But it’s estimated that between 1/3 and 1/2 are NSFW. That is, the subs they don’t want shown at their (mythical) IPO.
I’m pretty sure r/clipclop is considered respectable and mainstream now.
Troubling update from the Reddit admins. They are planning to remove mods from any subs that decide to stay private and hand them over to scabs. This goes back on their previous statements that subs had a right to protest and go private. Mods of one large community have already been contacted by the admins and told that “if you decide to close your community going forward, our Code of Conduct team will reach out with next steps”. Which is a fresh take on “nice kneecaps, shame if something happened to them”.
privately, i’ve kind of wondered whether Reddit does even care if all of its subreddits are moderated horribly, and if it doesn’t whether that renders anything short of taking your ball and going home moot
They’re shooting themselves in the foot with this stance. Handing over some very popular subreddits to the most aggressive, dissenting voices in a community who have no experience running that particular subreddit is a recipe for disaster. A hostile takeover is not going to set the new mods in a good light from the get-go, alienating them from the groups they’re supposed to be running and creating an adversarial relationship. This will not turn out the way they’re hoping.
r/subredditdrama would be trending ever day. Any controversial subreddit would be subject to astroturfing campaigns. Could you imagine if a political party decided to over throw mods of r/politics or r/news just before an election?
The whole point of a Reddit it is a community that is fostered by the moderators and the voting system. Hostile take overs of a subreddit will result in toxicity and encourage heavy handed moderation, restricted membership and make the popular subreddit echo chambers.
The CEO is changing too much, too fast, and with reckless abandon. You can’t change your pricing model, your business model and your value prop in one go. The best analogy I can come up with that it’s like he’s remodeling the kitchen and decided that a wrecking ball through the front of the house is a good idea.
I’m honestly not even surprised about this anymore
Stevie Wonder coulda seen that coming.
The thing that doesn’t make sense in that is if third party app users are such a small portion of Reddit overall, why even go after them in the first place? I could understand wanted to monetize groups taking advantage of the reddit API to train their AI models, but people making things to enhance the reddit experience?
According to a screenshot shared in the modcoord discord, there’s already a facist trying to take over /r/aww. The user is a former T_D mod, a sub which was actively involved in the January 6 riots and known for its misconduct across Reddit. These are the people that spez wants to empower.
that was my worry as well. Reddit is going to shit incredibly fast. Boot the mods and this is what we will get—a new, sitewide alt-right pipeline.
Let’s see the outcome.
That person’s profile is completely insane - far into the deep end. Fuck
https://mastodon.social/@robotdeathsquad/110543755195398954
Every time you hear the Reddit CEO talking about how they need to become profitable, remember they raised $250m and then spent the last couple years building this: https://nft.reddit.com
What.The.Fuck.
Sorry. I am at a loss for words.
I thought I had cringe resistance.
Something I’ve seen pointed out is that if Reddit ultimately does shift to a more “democratic” model of voting mods in and out, that could easily be abused by bot farms or for nefarious purposes. Everything about the future direction the site is heading sounds bleak and barely what it once was.
Like with a lot about Reddit, things have been implemented that sounds good on paper but little thought has been given to the consequences.
As for the electing mods/vox populi…[barf]
I can only imagine that 5his wasn’t a recent interview, but I know it’s not the case. He’s completely lost it. Very out of touch with what made Reddit Reddit.
I created this addon for Firefox to redirect all reddit pages to archive.org.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/reddit-to-wayback-machine/(I’d need to update to MV3 to port it to chrome, and I don’t know yet how have this functionality without webRequest)
This is awesome, thank you!
That sounds super useful! Does it also change www.reddit.com/… to the archived OLD.reddit.com version? Those seem to work much better, yet most Google results are to the new interface.
Yes, it checks the url is old reddit, if not make it old reddit.
if (!url.match(/^(http(s)?:\/\/)old\.reddit\.com/)) { url = "old.reddit.com" + url.split("reddit.com")[1]; }Very nice! I’m currently on chromium so I can’t use it – but it’s one more reason to switch back to Firefox :)
If they want their subs back so badly, let them take them. They can deal with moderation (or finding any decent mods at all) on their own.
Good luck with that, Reddit admins. lol.
The Verge: Full Interview: Reddit CEO Steve Huffman Isn’t Backing Down
TL;DR He is doubling down without really answering the important questions. Not why the deadline is so short (they’ve been talking about API changes forever), not if there could be a more reasonable pricing (=no) amd he doesn’t acknowlwdge there’s any value for Reddit from 3P apps.
Man, that guy’s an utter fucking cunt.
And so, it begins https://old.reddit.com/r/ModCoord/comments/14aeq5j/new_admin_post_if_a_moderator_team_unanimously/
Reddit CEO slams protest leaders, saying he’ll change rules that favor ‘landed gentry’
Reddit CEO Steve Huffman said Thursday that he wants to bring an end to a user-led protest that has made large parts of the influential website inaccessible this week. Huffman said in an interview that he plans to institute rules changes that would allow Reddit users to vote out moderators who have overseen the protest, comparing them to a “landed gentry.”
The protest took down thousands of message boards, known as subreddits, starting Monday, and some communities say they plan to continue the action indefinitely. The action has been led by Reddit’s unpaid, volunteer moderators, who have a high level of control over how their subreddits are run. Participating communities went “private,” making them unviewable even to members. The protesters oppose changes that will most likely cut off their ability to access Reddit through third-party apps, and their action has hobbled much of the site.
Huffman, also a Reddit co-founder, said he plans to pursue changes to Reddit’s moderator removal policy to allow ordinary users to vote moderators out more easily if their decisions aren’t popular. He said the new system would be more democratic and allow a wider set of people to hold moderators accountable.
Reddit’s current policy says moderators may be removed by higher-ranking moderators or by Reddit itself for inactivity or violations of Reddit-wide rules. They may also remove themselves. Many have held their positions for years.
“If you’re a politician or a business owner, you are accountable to your constituents. So a politician needs to be elected, and a business owner can be fired by its shareholders,” he said.
“And I think, on Reddit, the analogy is closer to the landed gentry: The people who get there first get to stay there and pass it down to their descendants, and that is not democratic.”
Moderators have argued that the high level of control over their communities is well-deserved because of the hours of free labor they’ve put into making and enforcing rules on their subreddits. Any plan to reduce their influence might result in another backlash.
Huffman, who co-founded Reddit 18 years ago this month, said he believes the leaders of the protest may have had popular support when it started Monday but have lost most of it since.
Can users vote out the CEO?
Rules for thee but not for me
Shareholders can.
Reddit doesn’t have any shares or shareholders currently.
Yup, fully aware. I guess what I was trying to say was that there is a way to get rid of a CEO - own a lot of the business.
The venture capitalists can if they have a majority of the shares. Since Reddit raised $1.3B, I wouldn’t be surprised if the VCs own more than 50%. The only exception would be if those shares by the VCs are non voting, but I can’t see a VC buying non voting shares.
Interesting point about the future of Reddit in that article:
Huffman said, however, that he’d like some form of revenue-sharing.
“I would like subreddits to be able to be businesses if they choose,” he said, adding that’s “another conversation, but I think that’s the next frontier of Reddit.”
The long-term goal is monetization of subreddits. I’m glad I won’t be there to see that happen.
The only lol ng term goal of most CEO is money in their pocket. But some are to dumb, since they often just fall upwards their whole life, so they run their company into the ground.
I think this is where the Fediverse can shine. If a Corp wants to join and host their own stuff, they can, and it will be really clear. Decentralization means that instead of a single broker of the information we can have a range from altruistic to straight up monetization exist side by side. But why some Corp would pay for a subreddit is crazy…I mean, what is the value prop? Companies would have to pay for the subreddit and then moderate it too?
At least when they were paying for bots and shills there was a modicum of plausible deniability.
If anything, the mods are indentured servants who toil on Lord Huffmans plots for free. Landed gentry, my ass.
That’s the exact definition of serfdom.
It’s frustrating that being a mod is first-come-first-serve, but people have been complaining about the system for many many years (/r/Canada is one strong example). So in a way, voting on mods could be a welcome change, but this is clearly not actually for the good of the community.
Judging by the newsprint from today; it feels like spez is still lost in his own delusion.
Right now he’s at the bargaining stage; trying to find out if he can weasel his way out of this shit. Fuck him. He dug his own career’s grave there. I’ve already established a community here on lemmy.
I stopped using reddit, don’t want to participate in this crime. There’s high possibility that reddit will not change direction, it’s better give a chance to alternatives and learn something new.
The people who refuse to learn something new and stay on reddit, like the people who jumped ship from Twitter to BlueSky instead of Mastodon, are exactly the kind of dim-bulbs the corporate suite want. They’re more concerned with usability than freedom from corporate influence. They’re more than happy to lose general autonomy and have corporations dictating how they interact with the world because, and let me emphasize this, they are too fucking lazy and pathetic to learn to do anything on their own. They are god damned babies looking for someone to hold their hand through life.
Boo Boo Bear speaking truth to power.
I do believe corporations rob us of our dignity and independence.
One could say that the people supporting mastodon with rhetoric like yours are too fucking lazy and pathetic to bother building a system with good UX. The choice is not in fact, “freedom” or “usability.” It’s very easy to have both, but mastodon supporters don’t seem to care. You are not owed anything, and no most people will not bother with some janky software.
If you want to change the world on a lager scale, do better, don’t blame others.
Nah. There’s an old maxim that states if you make something idiot-proof, they’ll just come out with a dumber idiot. The hell with them. Let’s build something smart. If they want in, they can smarten up.
too fucking lazy and pathetic to bother building a system with good UX
do better, don’t blame others.
You are not owed anything.
Make up your mind. You’re not owed a “good UX” from people who do this for you for free. Sorry you need hand holding to figure this shit out.
The opposite of “not interested in your jank software” is not “thinking they are owed improved software.” It’s called using alternatives, or even not using anything at all. Honestly aggressive insulting attitudes like yours are one of the big reasons I personally have no interest in mastodon.
I sure hope kbin/lemmy is not overrun with the arrogant tech bro vibe. It’s gross.
No, really, I want to know how lost you are here.
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I’m posting from Lemmy to a Beehaw thread, that just happened to mention Mastodon… This thread isn’t directly on Mastodon. People leaving for BlueSky over Mastodon is just a reference point.
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Making the choice that “usability matters” means you’re willing to shack up with Jack Dorsey and his horrible politics over a community.
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You don’t even know what a fucking techbro is. Steve Huffman, the goober who ran half us off of reddit, is a techbro. Jack Dorsey is a techbro. Palmer Luckey is a techbro. Elon Musk is a techbro. Wallstreetbets traders are techbros. Someone who only got into tech for money. I’m not sure if you’ve been paying attention but the people who are producing Free Open Source Software like Lemmy, Kbin, and Mastodon aren’t in it to make money and are in it to create communities.
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How is it insulting to say that the people who, once again are creating the place you are posting as a free service and not seeing remuneration, don’t owe it to anyone to spend their lives on usability when they are primarily a programmer and not user interface specialist? Like you yourself said, they don’t actually owe you that.
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Further, how is it insulting to say that people who don’t want to learn something because it isn’t immediately easy to use are lazy or unwilling to learn? Do you have any idea how many corporate pieces of shitty software with bad UI and usability I have been forced to and learned to use in my lifetime? Way too fucking many, and these are pieces of software private companies pay a fucking mint for. Yet somehow, each time, I was willing to learn how to use them, despite disliking them or thinking they could be done better. Not once did I think that the best course of action would be just not learn it and tell my boss the UX was terrible and they needed to do better.
I really think you need to lower your expectations from admins programming a free piece of software in their spare time and paying for server costs with donations. Also, seriously, figure out what a “techbro” is, it’s not the people giving you free shit with no ads who have decided not to enshittify their services to get more money while fucking over users. It’s also definitely not the people who want you to elevate yourself and learn something for the sake of learning it, instead expecting people (who. are. not. paid.) to make it easier for you, because you can’t be arsed.
Find a map, because you’re lost.
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There are some extremely excellent Mastodon clients already and web signups have been dumbed down significantly while still offering options. There is no point to be had here.
Yup, that’s honestly the history of the world — people giving their autonomy and independence and concern for what’s really going on in the world away to authorities in exchange for ease, comfort, convenience and habit, then being surprised when those authorities turn around and begin taking advantage of them. It’s the eternal struggle against apathy.
Well said. Bravo! I could not have said that better myself. I’m sorry to say you just described my mom. She’s a google addict who always tells me that she’d rather have usability over privacy. She actually told me once that “she doesn’t need privacy because she’s got nothing to hide.”
She signs up to hundreds of services with the same gmail and decades old password, I try to get her to use Tutanota or Proton or any number of password managers out there but she’s technologically illiterate and says it’s too complicated. I looked her up on Have I Been Pwned? and she had 17 data breaches on her account and 23 on an old one.
It’s so frustrating, she was willing to put her entire digital identity into the hands of corporations that time after time abuse and sell that data or in her case leak info in data breaches all because she’s to lazy to learn to randomize handles and use a password manager. I understand what you’re talking about man because I live with one and it frustrates me.
lol same. kbin has a better community anyways, and support subs are more useful
Woah. I mean, that article nails his whole attitude. It’s so depressing to see what was such a great site come crashing down because of one tech-bro’s hubris.
It stopped being an interesting site years ago, although there were some communities that were an exception. But generally those were the ones with intense moderation and/or small user bases.
Any sub that was regularly on the front page was moronic and close minded and the subs that were their political opposite were the same plus even more hateful and vile.
https://www.platformer.news/p/reddit-doubles-down
According to Casey Newton, “It seems also notable that Reddit is moving to centralize control of its ecosystem at the precise time that the rest of industry has begun to explore more federated models. When even Meta is preparing to launch a decentralized social network, it’s fair to ask whether Reddit has misread the moment.”
My take: Reddit’s API/IPO debacle puts them on the wrong side of history, as they double down on an outdated and unpopular social media model. Times are changing. What do you think?
https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/16/23763661/reddit-rif-is-fun-developer-ceo-steve-huffman
RIF developer pushing back on Huffman’s claims that RIF didn’t want to work with Reddit by releasing emails.
inb4 spez rants about him releasing private email conversations.
