Reddit risks losing its identity in pursuit of profits

L4sBot@lemmy.worldmod to Technology@lemmy.world – 1083 points –
Reddit risks losing its identity in pursuit of profits
techzine.eu

Reddit isn't profitable, despite having more than 50 million daily active users. In preparation for an IPO, CEO Steve Huffman put the platform's API

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It’s so true! I’d still be on Reddit too. Social media is not that big of a deal in my life. I never imagined having my nerve struck so hard. That I’d delete a 11yr old account. Loosing Apollo definitely would have lowered the amount of time I would have spent on Reddit, but I changed comments, burned my accounts, and did a gdpr request, when I saw Spez’s AMA and he doubled down against Christian. And Christian easily provided the call recordings. That was so terrible. I don’t want to be anywhere near that.

I still haven't fully moved on from it. I'm not sure if I'll delete my account or wipe my comments or not. I don't think it really hurts much to actually have an account registered with them(?)

There's also a fair chance that I've answered some useful techal support, programming guidance, or career guidance questions on there that would be lost to the search engine gods if I wipe my account... And that seems not so great.

I don’t think everyone needs to be so drastic. And helpful genuine answers on niche topics is how I found reddit in the first place. In a way, for me, reddit became a google alternative. I liked seeing a qualified discussion about something. Especially discussions about things that never feel trustworthy, from life, relationships or even product purchases. I always feel I can distill a conversation down to gain perspective. Lemmy will accomplish that, but it’s going to take time to build it.

I can’t see myself “using” Reddit again. But it will be inescapable to visit the site when I just need a good answer to things from years ago that were arrived upon in some old thread. To me that’s reddits greatest value. What we all contributed. So I totally understand why you can’t so handedly throw it all away.

This sounds a bit like Google's murdered project Vark.