Reddit Will License Its Data to Train LLMs, So We Made a Firefox Extension That Lets You Replace Your Comments
theluddite.org
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/19946388
An anticapitalist tech blog. Embrace the technology that liberates us. Smash that which does not.
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This only affects scrapers. If reddit is selling the data, they will just sell the unedited version from their database.
This is ineffective and deleting or editing reddit comments has always been a circle jerk to make yourself feel good that you are "hurting" reddit in some way.
While this is true, I also kind of doubt that Reddit isn’t just one mistake away from accidentally deleting an old db and losing the historical data. So it may in fact mess up their ability to sell the data.
Also potential GDPR violations etc if you’re in the EU
If they were that close, they wouldn't run a site which solely relies on the safeguarding of that data. I cannot imagine they don't know how to handle and backup data.
As for the gdpr, selling the data to an AI company for LLMs is probably anonymized. Or they have a database that does not contain any account information and only the posts. From a cursory read of the gdpr your personal data is your account, not necessarily your posts. If the posts are no longer associated with an account they are free game to reddit.
Ironically, deleting the accounts might make it easier for reddit to use the data.
And really just hurts people who are searching for actual human answers to questions later.
It also hurts reddit. Fewer useful lookups on reddit - fewer visits to reddit.
There was a time where there were many sites on the internet; hundreds, thousands even. And someone could search for content in topics they were interested in and find discussions in forums. I hope the internet becomes that again and sites like reddit burn to the ground, their servers salted to never grow again.
The world recovered from the burning of Alexandria, and it would recover from the death of reddit. And from the rumbling of their new ad injection schemes, the sooner the better.
Based!!!!