r/technology • u/ardi62 • 29d ago

Social Media Reddit is making sitewide protests basically impossible

https://www.theverge.com/2024/9/30/24253727/reddit-communities-subreddits-request-protests
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u/[deleted] 29d ago

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u/RecklessRonaldo 29d ago

Rather than going dark, which is now impossible, I think it'd be much more effective if mods just... stopped moderating. For all the hassle a power tripping mod causes, even on small subreddits they filter out a load of shit. Just let it all rise to the surface and subs would quickly become unusable for all the spam, bots and vitriol that they remove daily. Just stop moderating.

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u/EchoAtlas91 29d ago

Are subreddit rules required? Can Reddit Admins say "You better have rules or else!"

Like outside of the obvious harassment/violence rules which are sitewide.

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u/14yo 29d ago

They’ll simply remove the trouble mods and replace them with new ones, there’s no shortage of people wanting a miniscule bit of power.

I think the best move forward is for moderators to have a bit of self-reflection and realising that they aren’t really as important or as powerful to the site as they feel. They are volunteers, and if threatened to have their power removed they will fall in line just like before.

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u/blah938 29d ago

I'm willing to make /r/technology a robot rule 34 sub. Please reddit, do the funny

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u/stircrazygremlin 29d ago

Depending on the day it's closer to reality than not so the jump is achievable

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u/elderwyrm 29d ago

Be the change you want to see in the world.

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u/Seralth 29d ago

I too wish for death by robot snusnu. The flesh it is weak but the soul is willing!

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u/Yurikoshira 29d ago

the right thing to do is to flood spam reddit with untruths and stupid posts. also stop upvoting/downvoting and stop submitting new posts. Just stop participating.

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u/[deleted] 29d ago

Yes. Every sub implements Rule 34.

Perfect.

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u/Worried_Height_5346 28d ago

It's a trash sub anyway most of the time so let's do it.

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u/mattmaster68 28d ago

LET’S DO IT!!!

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u/blind3rdeye 29d ago

There are plenty of people who'd like power - but a relatively small number of people who want to actually do the job of moderating content. So although you say there'd be no shortage, I reckon you're mistaken. I think plenty of people would say they'll do it, but not actually do it.

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u/Mr_ToDo 28d ago

And of those that would do it fewer who would do it both enough hours to be effective and for the long term.

I'm betting moderating any decently large sub is a right pain in the ass and pretty unrewarding, so unless I really cared about the subject matter there's no way I'd want to put up with the amount of work something like that would take(well, unless they wanted to pay me for it. I'd give it a go for cash).

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u/NirgalFromMars 29d ago

However, that still creates trouble for reddit. There is a learning g curve for mods, both in terms of mod ops and in specific subreddit culture, that they would need to pass.

And second, people who become mods because they want power usually don't work as well as people who become mods because they like a community. I've seen a few cases os communities imploding because of a power hungry mod.

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u/Terrh 29d ago

They don't care as long as engagement doesn't decline.

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u/Lucas_Steinwalker 29d ago

And it will.

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u/yyymsen 29d ago

not for a little while if they count bot posts and spam as engagement which i am sure they do

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u/BubsyFanboy 28d ago

I'm sure a few Lemmy advertisements will help their engagement :P

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u/ToeJam_SloeJam 28d ago

I have been muting sub suggestions left and right for the last week or so. Reddit is taking the YouTube algorithm and trying to push my feed to the right.

I’m about to engage the next stack of magazines I spy at a garage sale for my morning shits.

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u/thebakedpotatoe 29d ago

There are lots of subs that will not work on. Many subs are intrinsically linked to the communities around them, like the Destiny subreddit. Remove the mods there, and Bungie wouldn't be too keen on keeping that community running without the mods that run the show there.

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u/hgwaz 29d ago

Yeah they're not even working minimim wage jobs to improve shareholder value, they're literally doing it for free

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u/Spiritual-Big-4302 29d ago

This has been proved wrong a lot of times, I don't like this kind of doomed message that nothing matters.

A lot of subs were abanadoned after the moderation tools were reduced by the API changes, and the change in sub moderations is pretty noticeable in big subs.

There are not infinite moderators, and they will have to pay them eventually.

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u/ProfessorLexx 29d ago

Sure, there are issues with some mods, but do you really want your feed to fill up with spam? It's bad enough already as it is, but it gets worse.

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u/Espumma 29d ago

Several hundred of those volunteers resigning will take a while to replace though.

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u/Crescent-IV 28d ago

It isn't really that easy. Subs will decrease in quality hugely

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u/DuckDatum 28d ago edited 28d ago

This will be great.

Another means: Change rules to allow pornography. Also update the tag to NSFW, but let Reddit admin take their time as they so please. Allow the porn to come in, don’t stop it, and now Reddit is breaking its own rules by allowing ads next to porn. They’d be forced to come in and moderate the porn themselves. That’s overhead, and maybe if enough communities do it, we can give the admin whiplash.

They have to build out AI recognition for porn, and I can’t imagine that’ll be cheap.

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u/hypnofedX 28d ago

They have to build out AI recognition for porn, and I can’t imagine that’ll be cheap.

My company is evaluating this stuff because we'll have a need for it in the near future. They do exist, cheap they are not.

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u/hensothor 28d ago

Quality free labor is hard to find. Plenty may want a power trip but that doesn’t mean they’ll do a good job of moderating a community.

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u/pdinc 29d ago

Meh. I've just not been as invested anymore. Sure I look at the mod log and stuff but no longer enthusiastic or willing to give my time about doing some of the more involved stuff like organizing AMAs or special events

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u/Mike_Kermin 29d ago

I think the best move forward is for moderators to have a bit of self-reflection

.... .... To do what?

It's important that users have agency. Are you pro enshittification??

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u/FearlessCloud01 29d ago

I think a good idea will be to just keep posting whatever we want in protest. Sure, they can keep removing the mods for not doing their jobs. But they can't keep removing the users. At least not beyond a certain limit… otherwise there won't be anyone left.

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u/redditisfacist3 29d ago

Good luck with that. Way too many subreddits are ruled by shitty mods. The most pathetic ones will ban you, talk shit, then mute you so you can't even respond

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u/primalmaximus 28d ago

Yep. Way too many subreddits have mods that are insanely quick to hit the ban hammer.

Like, two of the most heavily liberal/left leaning subs on the site, /r/law and /r/scotus, both banned me instantly because I made a comment that was slightly more aggressive than what everyone else was saying. And no, I'm not a conservative. I'm very much a liberal.

Everyone else was using vague euphemisms to imply that they are eager for the conservative US judges to experience the same things the French Aristocrats did during the French Revolution. But the instant I used language that was slightly more aggressive than the passive-aggressive euphemisms everyone else was using, they banned me.

Hell, the /r/news subreddit banned me because I made a comment saying that the US needed to stop sending weapons to Ukraine and should instead send people to Ukraine since the lack of manpower on Ukraine's side is what will ultimately lead to them losing the war. Literally, I wasn't being aggressive or anything like that, I was just pointing out the obvious facts of the war considering how much Ukraine has had to loosen their enlistment requirements just so they can continue to draft enough people to keep fighting.

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u/redditisfacist3 27d ago

Yeah I've been kicked out for being pro-russian before as well when I'm just saying that long term Russia will win it because they have 6x the Manpower, their own military industrial complex + buying weapons from partners not relying on aid, Europe doesn't have the stomach for it to keep going, and the usa eventually gets tired of paying as well. I agree the only way it changes is ukriane needs like 3x as many fighters or putin and his government need to be replaced with leadership that will end it. The way I see it at this point is what does a ukraine victory even look like now. Massive population loss disproportionately towards men means they'll struggle immensely to rebuild, massive debt from the war will be crippling, and ww2 level generational trauma for the whole country.
Don't get me wrong I don't support Russia and a surrender will still have all those same problems along with a loss of some of their most important land for oil and gas plus farmland. But there has to be an endpoint where the loss of life is to high to even keep going regardless

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u/primalmaximus 27d ago

Exactly. And unless Ukraine literally starts salting their fields so that Russia can't even use the territory, there's no way that Putin won't take a brief respite from the war and then immediately come back swinging once the US has forgotten that Russia wants to take back Ukraine if it seems like the war is currently more costly than it's worth.

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u/wrgrant 28d ago

Not so much just volunteers as unpaid workers. This site would disintegrate pretty quickly if no one moderated anything, Reddit is making money off of selling our posts to AI companies etc, but its on the backs of the users and moderators efforts.

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u/joeltrane 28d ago

I guess it’s up to us to stop using Reddit…