Reddit hasn't turned a profit in 20 years, filed to go public anyway(cnn.com)
cnn.com
Reddit hasn't turned a profit in 20 years, filed to go public anyway
https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/23/tech/reddit-ipo-filing-business-plan/index.html
5 comments
Also for Spez. IPO, become a billionaire, bid farewell to Reddit after however long he's contractually obligated to stay, and... well, idk. I guess many billionaires aren't satisfied with merely retiring with more money than multiple generations of families can ever hope to spend. I suppose find another business to extract from? Or lobby?
I’m going to take great personal joy in watching Reddit burn itself alive.
Reddit founders just want to cash in. u/spez made $200M last year in compensation which made him one of the highest paid CEO in the bay area. they simply couldn't give 2 fucks about what happens after the IPO, they know their site is a liability , riddled with depravity... and Google wants to train its AI on that crap?
"Only" a million of that was in cash, the rest was in stock awards and stock options. So he has to care about what happens after the IPO.
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1713445/000162828024...
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1713445/000162828024...
Think about it... Google could train its AI to recognize malicious behavior for moderation purposes, to recognize astroturfing and manipulation of public opinion (for purposes of stopping it or carrying it out).
There's not much value in training it to simulate a redditor, but there's a lot in modeling bad behavior.
There's not much value in training it to simulate a redditor, but there's a lot in modeling bad behavior.
With all the major social media sites committing suicide via enshittification, it seems like forums might be primed to go back to being mostly small and local again (discord etc).
Reddit though, I’m really going to miss since they’ve avoided pissing in the pool they swim in longer than most of the others. And, because the only google results that are useful anymore are the ones where you append “Reddit” to the end of your search.
I think, on some level, the people who own and run these sites don’t actually understand where the value in them comes from. Namely, the quality of the interactions between users. By replacing those interactions with paid advertisements or by making moderation more difficult they are directly attacking the very thing that makes the site useful. And they don’t understand that. More likely in this case, they don’t care. The game they are playing is to try to turn human interaction into money, and you can’t do that by making the interaction better. The point of advertising, after all, is not to reveal truth but distort it in order to manipulate the user.
What we need is a Reddit type of site that’s run more on the Wikipedia model and less on the Facebook model.
The original version of google seemed like magic because it provided such easy results- but you have to remember that google didn’t generate those results. The links between topics came in the form of hyperlinks between documents that were set up one at a time by human beings, and google merely mined those links to fuel its engine. Later on, people stopped creating hyperlinks, and so google’s search mostly stopped working. So it’s no wonder that Reddit’s hand curated forums are now a better source of information.
Reddit though, I’m really going to miss since they’ve avoided pissing in the pool they swim in longer than most of the others. And, because the only google results that are useful anymore are the ones where you append “Reddit” to the end of your search.
I think, on some level, the people who own and run these sites don’t actually understand where the value in them comes from. Namely, the quality of the interactions between users. By replacing those interactions with paid advertisements or by making moderation more difficult they are directly attacking the very thing that makes the site useful. And they don’t understand that. More likely in this case, they don’t care. The game they are playing is to try to turn human interaction into money, and you can’t do that by making the interaction better. The point of advertising, after all, is not to reveal truth but distort it in order to manipulate the user.
What we need is a Reddit type of site that’s run more on the Wikipedia model and less on the Facebook model.
The original version of google seemed like magic because it provided such easy results- but you have to remember that google didn’t generate those results. The links between topics came in the form of hyperlinks between documents that were set up one at a time by human beings, and google merely mined those links to fuel its engine. Later on, people stopped creating hyperlinks, and so google’s search mostly stopped working. So it’s no wonder that Reddit’s hand curated forums are now a better source of information.
Reddit on the Wikipedia model is Lemmy.
I wouldn't call Lemmy a Wikipedia model. There's no peer review to try and establish a base of knowledge. You're only so free to edit "entries" in that you can fork off a federation and make your own to host.
I'm not even sure if the models are compatible. Reddit was designed to cycle through modern news and discussions, focusing on presenting the new over the important/relevant, or the most agreeable over the most well written/researched. Reddit plays to the Wisdom of the Crowds, Wheras Wikipedia at least attempts to fight the popular opinion through uses of credible, professional sources (which sometimes works against the idea of being a "base of knowledge")
I'm not even sure if the models are compatible. Reddit was designed to cycle through modern news and discussions, focusing on presenting the new over the important/relevant, or the most agreeable over the most well written/researched. Reddit plays to the Wisdom of the Crowds, Wheras Wikipedia at least attempts to fight the popular opinion through uses of credible, professional sources (which sometimes works against the idea of being a "base of knowledge")
> Reddit though, I’m really going to miss since they’ve avoided pissing in the pool they swim in longer than most of the others.
Did you miss the API protests and them effectively killing off 3rd party apps?
Did you miss the API protests and them effectively killing off 3rd party apps?
That was recent, after avoiding pissing in the pool longer than most others ...
It launched 18 years ago.
It launched 18 years ago.
Yes, this is exactly what I meant. The recent changes are all in the wrong direction, but for a short period of time, they will make a lot of money. I would call that pissing in the pool. But it’s recent.
They removed premium accounts, removed people buying awards before going ipo too.
Ahahah seriously? What incredible mismanagement, I met someone who worked at reddit on the product 2 years ago at a superbowl party and they made fun of me for wanting to use the old.reddit.com site over the new one. It was wild, I really expected a wry smile like "yeah i know it sucks but we gotta do it cause the execs want it". It was crazy to me how much they didn't understand their userbase or product.
It's been 5 years and they haven't figured out how to make a video player yet. Neither the old version or the new version work. Click to play, nothing. Click again to play, it plays for 3 seconds then stops?
It's incredible how poor reddit engineering is, but it was dwarfed by management ineptitude.
It's incredible how poor reddit engineering is, but it was dwarfed by management ineptitude.
Way more than 5 years. Reddit's video player has been terrible since I can remember.
Organisations can't pretend. They will start believing their own lies.
Awards still exist. They just streamlined them. Instead of 100 different awards which cluttered the interface right below the post title, they replaced them with 6-7 variations of gold and simplified the UI and look & feel.
Yeah, the main thing is that
1) they don't show on old reddit (I see this as an absolute win)
2) You can't Gold NSFW subs, because....
3) A number of Gold upvotes + posting karma can be exchanged for real world money. Yes, this is probably even worse than what you are imagining. To give a few details of this wonderful idea:
There's not much upside here as a user unless you need yet another hustle in life.
1) they don't show on old reddit (I see this as an absolute win)
2) You can't Gold NSFW subs, because....
3) A number of Gold upvotes + posting karma can be exchanged for real world money. Yes, this is probably even worse than what you are imagining. To give a few details of this wonderful idea:
- They say you need to "qualify", but the bar is 10 gold upvotes + 100 karma in 12 months. 100 karma may as well not be a barrier.
- They have pretty weak justifications for how to fight Spam/bots... because they've done a horrible job the last decade fighting spam/bots and it's only gotten worse last year. There's no incentive for them to fight bots anyway.
- Mods can participate in this. And it is not based on their moderation behavior
There's not much upside here as a user unless you need yet another hustle in life.
I think making the post look like a pimped Pakistani truck was much of the lure.
Making a number go from 4 to 5 probably does not have the same lure for the whales.
Making a number go from 4 to 5 probably does not have the same lure for the whales.
Thing is not many were buying expensive awards when smaller much much cheaper awards were available at their disposal. They perhaps found from their research that giving so much choice to users was working against them in this case and took this decision.
This kind of logic leads to websites riddled with dark patterns. Just because something works in an A/B test doesn’t make it a good decision.
As much as I deride any kind of awards except classic gold, I think this was one of their better decisions all things considered.
why would they remove revenue sources before going IPO? that seems pretty counterintuitive.
They removed it about 8 months ago, and then 4 months ago they brought it back but with a contributor program. TL;DR you can cash out karma and gold for real money now:
https://old.reddit.com/r/reddit/comments/16ryhv9/celebrating...
https://old.reddit.com/r/reddit/comments/16ryhv9/celebrating...
I guess following X's path of membership after going public might make it sustainable.
No it absolutely won't because they won't have people there making the site relevant and good, in the exact same way X is a site that had value and now it's below the threshold where it's worth my time.
those of us who know about Spezs penchant for Jailbait and Cannibals.
You know, the stuff that got him compromised by Ghislaine in the first place.