Some subreddits could be paywalled, hints Reddit CEO

Taking lessons from Elon.

Maybe they need to charge users a monthly fee and add blue check marks. Lol

It's kind of indicative of how bad the web has gotten that twitter and reddit still have users. Digg completely imploded over much less than this. Just that back in 2010, there was somewhere else to go.

inb4 Lemmy. I get it, but we're not there yet.

Quarterly reports demand that line go up.

The line must always go up.

He's trying to make money, he doesn't care about the platform or its future. The Boeing's CEO during the two 737 MAX crashes had to resign... with $62.2 million in his pockets. These people live in a different world.

https://www.ft.com/content/522fab9c-34f2-11ea-a6d3-9a26f8c3cba4

The enshittification must go on!

Lot of wishful thinking in here. Fact is, Reddit isn't going anywhere.

The way I interpret what he is suggesting is that they are planning on going after Patreon type websites that provide a private paid for space for a creator's supporters. It's unlikely, but they could also pretty easily go after OF to keep that traffic on site.

Short-term gains > *

I kinda love to see it. These companies can't help themselves.

Businesses really are just artificial mines, aren’t they?

That was the first sales pitch for Reddit gold. That they just needed a couple bucks a month to pay for the servers. Lots of power uses back then did just that, and felt pretty good about themselves. There were people also arguing even then that anybody who paid Reddit’s bills for them was an idiot, but lots of people did.

Yeah this feels like a move that would have worked a lot better before Reddit had burned a bunch of bridges with their most active users.

The pool of people with enough goodwill to pay now is likely small, and shrinking. The causal new users probably are that keen to pay up either.

I’d happily pay 29.99 to access /r/japancirclejerk2

Fark still exists with that small monthly payment to support the site model. Drew, the owner, regularly meets up with folks, too. And if you’re a subscriber he must buy you a beer if you ask him per the “terms” of service.

A nice, relatively small, community. That’s what Reddit used to be. Your post really resonated with me.

If anything, they're the ones benefiting from altruistic users giving them free labor to profit off of.

I guess reddit was feeding me all those ads out of the kindness of their hearts and took no money for hosting them. "Altruistic", lol.

The altruistic, free version of Reddit is Lemmy.

The users used to be altruistic, helping other people just because they wanted to be friendly. Because the site used to feel like a real community. But, now that the site is so clearly for-profit I think a lot of users are going to be much less helpful to strangers.

It's hard to quit the site because it gets so much traffic, which means so much stuff gets posted there. On the other hand, I think the high-quality comments from someone trying to help out are less common.

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

I’ve switched to using this as well but it has very little user interaction. I hope it grows and is able to compete with Reddit one day. It would be nice to be able to go to a basketball or political subreddit (what do we call them here?) and actually be able to have a nice conversation.

Welcome!

Then following up by threatening to sue all the users who deleted the comments they made and left

Y not?

Nah spez_Fu*ker101.com

Welcome to Lemmy. Go fuck yourself /s

Hello hello! Welcome!

welcome here 👋

The best thing is how many different servers people are from here. No single gatekeeper who can wreck it.

Welcome back to trench.

Yay, new friend!

welcome here 👋

Welcome friend 😁

Heyyy!!! Happy to have you here. Enjoy it while it's small ;) feels like old Internet here.

Hey nice to have ya!

Friendly reminder that the Fediverse is awesome, and you have the power to control the content in your feed not only by which subs you subscribe to or instances you make an account on, but also which you can block - including specific users if it comes to that. Of course, instance admins can do the same, and if that happens to content you want to see, you can always make a new account on a different instance and see everything.

It takes a little to understand the Fediverse structure, but imo it's one of the best ways social media can be structured.

Remember to try hiding vote display and see how it changes your usage. It’s underrated feature that imo makes you focus on the quality of the content rather than popularity.

Greetings, happy to have you. :)

They don't care as long as they can get in, make a few bucks, and get out. Long-term stability isn't the priority anymore, just quick profits.

The decent ones always either die or turn into a boomer parasite

The sad thing is yeah, he did, and Alex Ohanian played Switzerland

And the moderators

This got under my skin too.

That parasite constantly refers to user content and comments and as being the property or Reddit, and his schemes to generate profit off the back of that asset are almost always to the detriment of the user base who are keeping him in business.

Like all rich assholes, he's got this expectation that everyone will deeply respect and admire his mission to enrich himself by exploiting whatever market he has access to.

Didn't feel altruistic when they told me I couldn't put affiliate links in the sidebar for my subreddit.

Are they TRYING to kill the site or what?

Okay now which one are we all expecting?

Just had some more thoughts on this as well.

If Reddit can lure Patreon users, they could also likely protect that content creators data from being shared on the platform. The creator uploads a commissioned drawing for it's paid users, and then someone tries to copy it and show it in /r/pics. But since reddit has the source image, they could be scanning for identical images by hash, or matching images via AI and then prevent it from being posted outside the community.

It definitely isn't THAT easy, but it opens up the potential, and being able to tell your potential customers you have tools to help prevent unauthorized sharing on a prolific platform probably has some merit.

As others have pointed out, it'll be more like OnlyFans most likely.

Welcome, I left after the third party clients got nuked, sick of ads

Welcome to the Fediverse!

If you haven’t already you should check out Fedi.Tips as well as the other federated networks.

Also, for secure DMs, you will want to check out Matrix.

Finally, you will want to invite others onto the Fediverse as well.

Same. I started using Reddit about 7 years ago... about 2 years ago it took a nose dive.

It's the final stage of the pump n dump.

They think that their domination is strong enough so that after an initial backlash, the users will come back since they have nowhere else to go. And they’re kind of right.

Spez got his millions, he no longer cares, probably.

They think they are so entrenched that the thought of users leaving is not a consideration at all. He said it himself and been proven right. Governments are also asleep at the wheel. Their users are prisoners.

Self destructive addiction even happens to corporations.

Much like you I saw this article on my reddit feed today, googled 'reddit alternatives, and ended up here.

Me too! I just made an account. I’m discovering Lemmy right now. This is my very first reply. Hello Lemmy world!

Sure till they copystrike their own subs

The common thread I've seen online is this:

• Google's search algorithm sucks. I always append reddit.com to get good forum results
• Reddit's search algorithm sucks.

These two tools are quickly becoming coupled for Google-Fu expert users. The historical forum history that goes back 3-5 years on Reddit is their goldmine. You can't just make a new subreddit overnight when a sub gets paywalled. All of that historical data will be lost and paywalled.

I think a paywall could be an effective money maker for Reddit because they've basically become their own Google - in that each subreddit acts like a unique website with real, human, responses. The only problem is that reddit has a god awful search algorithm that they refuse to improve. So people use Google to essentially search reddit. The "whales" so-to-speak are the only people they need to capture. People like myself (frugal people) aren't in their peripherals. But the people that think "I'll pay each month for NYT" or "it's just a few dollars for the WSJ" are going to use the same logic for Reddit: "it's a small amount of money to have access to high quality forums on X, Y, and Z".

In addition, this might bolster Reddit's content even further. Since paywalled subs will automatically reduce the amount of AI content spammed on them, they will inherently increase the legitimacy of each forum.

Lastly, this will give them a path towards monetization for moderators which doesn't require them skimming off of their own pay checks to achieve it.

Do I like this? No. Is this fair? Also no. People contributed to Reddit under the impression that their data would be available and accessible to anyone with an Internet connection. That implicit guarantee is being violated. It's an afront to the hard working individuals that have developed these communities brick by brick.

But does this "solution" make a lot of business sense? Possibly. As long as they survive the changeover in the short term, I think they'll thrive from this choice for the reasons I stated above.

Again, it's going to give them a pathway for:

• Monetization
• Reduce AI spam (a big fear of all forums)
• They could make even more money off the back of this

I'm pretty much over Reddit anyways. Lemmy has been my backup social media for a while now. The Internet is still free - for now. I just hope we can all find better search engines and forums in the future. Google has been degrading. Reddit has been locking things down. We obviously need to pivot to other platforms. Or maybe just go back to the old days where you find niche forums hosted by some dude in his basement. Nothing wrong with that.

I've seen some content creators having a discord channel that is pay to get into where the content creator participates in it as a way to generate additional money. I suspect Reddit wants to do something similar and take a cut of fee.

And I fully expect this to devolve into becoming a new OnlyFans.

Hey! Welcome!

I recently joined as well. It's actually very nice here.

Let's make something nice ^_^

"Oh pics_free exists let's quickly ban that community before we loose revenue ... I mean because they violated the rules"

inb4 they make creating new subs cost money too

The problem with media platforms like Reddit and Twitter is that they take place in a single Instance, with thousands of communities. So it's easy for one person (like an Elon Musk) to completely screw it up for millions of people.

With Lemmy, everything is decentralized. Communities are spread out and duplicated over hundreds of Instances in many countries. So if somebody ruins one Instance or community, people can just hop over to the second or third most popular Instance, and the original instance will dry up and disappear.

I just joined - in fact this is my first comment. I was tired of my page (and now comment sections) getting flooded with ads.

The Reddit experience isn’t going to get better, it’s just going to get more profitable for shareholders.

Just logged into my year old account, checks out

Hopefully I'm thinking of maybe getting reddit just to copy content to lemmy and to advertise it.

Yep, I’m one of them

Hi

So they will make money of people's nudes and they will still expect them to post them for free?

Or maybe they will share it with users? but still this isn't good for actual communities.

Yup, this is going to be their first stop

Reddit: what are users for but to extract money from?

But they're going to split the profits with content generators users, right? Right?

Proof of concept for allowing super users to have a patreon model maybe?

Though I can't remember the last time there were site wide famous users. Last I remember is that bird lady.

If this is their endgame the bot problem would get even worse as the value proposition improves for abusers

So...this is for porn.

Only if those subreddits have something where the user... creating that gets a portion of every subscription payment.

Only if it's a competitive model, only fans takes 15%, not sure about patreon, fansly, and other platforms. So reddit will need to take no more than 15% for creators to want to participate. And if you monetize a sub with multiple users, how will you spread the money? And how are you making sure reddit is paying out the fair share? So pay wall subs won't really work unless they are exclusive to one creator.

But... How? What's stopping people from cross posting ? Creating new subreddits that mirror closed ones?

I mean that's a lot of effort for very little reward...

It's called digital enclosure. Enclosure was a movement that began in Britain in the 1700s (but really it's always been going on...) to close off the commons that pastoralists had been using to publicly graze their sheep. It happens to all new media because it's the only way capitalists can imagine their operations.

I've been here since they shut down third-party apps. It gets better each time they piss off more of the user base and ya'll join the rest of us. Hahaha.

Welcome.

Burn, baby, burn!

So you're lying.

All posts about reddit is them shooting themselves in the foot. So you must be upvoting all the Reddit posts ;)

Oh no! Where will I go to see OF spam bots now???

It’s steve huffman so it’s definitely for jailbait porn.

Who goes to Reddit for porn when so many other better options exist? I always thought that was weird. That'd be the last place I'd look for it.

Also, commenting about porn is creepy as hell to me. Like, I do not want to read some other person's opinions/fantasies about a piece of media I'm jerkin' it to. It's like the people that try to make smalltalk at the urinal. Get in, do your business, get out, and keep that shit to yourself.

I just made one this is my first comment lol

Go forth and post memes in your favorite community

Yep. About a year now. Happy belated cake day to RIFugees.

Yeah. 4 accounts getting randomly banned was enough for me. This will just prey on the clueless who don't know your account can get shadow banned for any reason (or no reason).

Then they'll skate around that by implementing a paywall for creating new subs.

My first thought was that they are trying to be a new onlyfans.

Over the last few years I've started to notice this weird increase in people misspelling the word paid as 'payed'. Where is this coming from ?

It's hilarious. Huffy's idea is to turn Reddit into the Company Store.. what's that, all you unpaid moderators, all you users who spent countless hours posting essays of valuable information? You all want to ACCESS this content that was provided to us free, FOR FREE? EF YOU PAY ME.

He's got to justify his $193 million compensation on the backs of the unpaid labor of moderators and users who provided the actual thing that made reddit valuable.

Steve Huffman is a carbuncle. When I quit Reddit, I ran a browser plug-in that deleted every single post and comment I ever made. I hope more people do this, and slowly lance this $193 million abscess.

I am looking forward to more non-tech communities.

Some of us are from there. We can't all be that bad.

I thought that most people from here are just from various influxes of redditors.

What you want is quality of small platforms with the amount of content from big. It’s unsolvable problem so far

Isn't that stock still up?

I can't even imagine the creators in those subreddits would be thrilled since so many of them seemingly use those subs as a free advertising spot for their onlyfans. More of them are trying to be creative with overtly sexual questions in askreddit and people just stumbling in to their profile.

They had that, you get enough gold you get access to the lounge where people with internet money just talk about how to spend their points in other people.

Funny, you get enough virtual gold folks just want to share it. Real money, not so much

Elon's farts, very musky ones

Hire me

Welcome back!

I could also see them banning outside links for patreon etc if they're trying to take over that space and get a cut. Huh, guess they're not happy just getting money from user content, they might feel like they deserve part of the creator's profits as well.

I am 100% convinced Twitter is being intentionally destroyed by a cabal of evil oligarchs and nation states.

Cute of you to assume this is right v left issue... actually it dilatory.

This was always bottom v top...

I absolutely believe the theory that Spez & Musk are being paid handsomely under the table

First of all, it's Steve Huffman, don't use his reddit username. By doing that you're making it hard to tie the asshole to these shitty things he's doing.

Second of all, he doesn't have that kind of power. He's just the CEO. He's answerable to investors who would remove him if he were trying to tank the site. As CEO he also doesn't get to make most of the changes, he's just the guy who might have final say.

What's happening with Reddit is what happens to startups when interest rates rise. Investors who used to be willing to wait to get paid now want their money right away. So, they risked long-term damage to get paid in the short term. They rushed an IPO so the VCs could get their money out. And, now that they're public, they have to keep grinding out short-term profits for their shareholders even if it dooms their long-term prospects. At the moment network effects are keeping people there, and the enshittification of the service isn't enough to chase them away. But, I only give it a few years until it's gone.

Until recently, I would have expected that once it flames out, someone like Meta or Google would buy it. But, now that we're actually starting to see robust anti-trust action, maybe that wouldn't be allowed, and it will just flame out and die.

As for Twitter, that's just a rich guy who thinks he's a genius. Virtually all ultra-rich people own media properties. Because, as the saying goes, "Never argue with a man who buys ink by the barrel". Jeff Bezos went the traditional route and bought the Washington Post. Musk thought he could do the same thing (and maybe turn a profit) with Twitter. He didn't actually want to buy it though, but he's such an idiot that he was forced to honor something he said as a joke. Once he bought it, he knew that it was a money-losing company, so he thought he could use his ruthlessness and "business genius" to fire most of the useless people and still keep it running. But, he didn't understand the relationship advertisers had with Twitter.

Advertisers spent money on Twitter (not a lot, but a decent amount) because Twitter's trust and safety team made it a relatively safe ad. You might appear next to something goofy, but it wasn't going to be too awful. But, get rid of the trust and safety team and invite Nazis back to the platform and advertisers don't want to be seen next to that content, so they're going to leave. Even if he could credibly bring back the trust and safety team and allow them to do their jobs, it would take a while to re-establish that trust with the advertisers. But, bringing back the trust and safety team goes directly against his other reason for owning Twitter, which is to push a certain agenda that he likes and/or that generates money for him. He wants or needs the nazis on the site for political reasons, but they're destroying the profitability of the site.

I don't buy that Musk is being paid under the table because there's literally nobody rich enough to do that. It would take, at a minimum tens of billions to bribe him. If you had tens of billions to spend, there are a lot more effective ways to use it than bribing musk. Buying a supreme court justice seems to take nothing more than tens of millions. Winning a congressional or senate seat is a similar price.

Now, if you thought Moscow had compromat on Musk, that would be different. I could see him spending half his fortune to make sure that didn't come out. But, I still think that his ego explains what's happening better than some kind of nefarious thing.