Eric A. MeyerTwitter learned, and Reddit is fast learning, that people are not addicted to the platform, they’re addicted to the community they found there. Ruin the community, and people will leave the platform. It really is that simple.
laxsill@Meyerweb really puts this quote in perspective https://edition.cnn.com/2023/06/12/tech/reddit-blackout/index.html
Lewis@laxsill I love this one. I don't know why anyone would decide to moderate a subreddit as Reddit exists today. It's not a community run platform and it won't even be a privately traded company for much longer. Why would anyone donate time for the betterment of a wealthy, publicly traded social media giant?
Arve@lewishazell @laxsill as a long time moderator on Reddit: you don’t choose to moderate, moderation chooses you because you care about the health of a community you participate in. Those are the mods Reddit have now pissed off. Reddit’s multi-year effort to make the job as miserable as possible for us, including killing apps that make moderation on mobile tolerable, is driving us away. Which is why the blackout will last until they remove us or fix their shit.
@arve @laxsill It's very noble of you and I can definitely understand the sense of community can outweigh the state of the platform. I just can't see myself stepping up to volunteer my time to effectively be the backbone of someone else's company. At this point they're basically calling anyone using their API, for moderation or not, freeloaders for using it without paying. That's my problem with it, they won't give as much as a thank you and eventually demand payment.
@lewishazell @laxsill It doesn't start that way. The first subreddit I got involved in had one member - me - and was intended for Norwegians on Reddit to post articles in Norwegian. Before we turned off the lights at midnight CET, we typically saw 350-400k unique users every month, with 50k on any given day.
I also moderate a few others that started with a few thousand subscribers, but now into the millions.
It's about wanting community without becoming a sysadmin