I feel like it has to be financially motivated and the only thing I can think of is they want users paying for premium directly rather than having it gifted from a different accounting bucket. But that doesn’t seem like strong enough motivation on the surface.
So they’re getting rid of coins and awards, but don’t have any kind of replacement actually planned yet?
They should have held off until they knew what the replacement would be. As it is, they’re yanking something that made Reddit unique for…what, exactly?
Quora is an impeccable font of online knowledge and we should be grateful for bwahaha no I can't even...
Basically the amount of karma farming that already happens on Reddit is going to quadruple. And yeah it's going to be a) on the more 'serious' questions like Quora and b) on the more AITA or Confessions posts 'oh you guys have helped me so much, of you can upvote me and give me some awards it'll really help get my life on track'
Part of me couldn't believe they'd actually introduce this but in light of everything this year, whatever. Because what else could benefit Reddit ....oh yeah - grifters!
If they want to add fuel to the fire that's burning down the house fine. I'm over at Kbin. I'm staying.
My only regret is there's some really great health support communities there and I hope they can be allowed to live in peace because I don't think they'll feasibly migrate.
I’m only on reddit for a few select, very specific communities. If I ever find a replacement it’s over. Help with Immigration laws, teach practices, language learning ECT. I’m thinking maybe I’d like to start the teachers group over here.
Last I checked, there were at least 3 subreddits where cryptocurrency is being handed out regularly to active participants.
They’re called “Community Points”, and get a custom name for each sub (“moons” in /r/cryptocurrency, “donuts” in /r/ethtrader, and “bricks” in /r/fortniteBR.)
I don’t know how the other subs fared, but /r/cryptocurrency became noticeably gamed by actors attempting to maximize their financial gains.
It's certainly worth paying to hear American views over the rest of the worlds I would say. Reddit is on to a winner with that one for sure. American Reddit users like u/spez are so wise while we are so stupid.
A company headquartered in the US but it's a website that has a presence in many countries, including the EU.
Maybe not surprising, but they are probably shortchanging themselves by not allowing folks from abroad to contribute into the program. USians aren't the only content creators.
They're willing to pay idiots to ramble on but they aren't willing to pay international lawyers to straighten out all the paperwork so they can do this outside the US.
Reddit really is done. This will drive spam and discourage people posting original content as they will see it stolen and reposted by the karma farming parts of reddit. They already flood communities with crap; reddit seems to just be taking another giant crap on the moderators who will have to deal with the tide of people trying to manipulate the new system for financial gain.
The best content on Reddit is not by "top contributors" whoever they may be. It's the random helpful posts that you stumble across or find on Internet seaches, or the thought provoking posts and comments that push back against the hive mind. Generally I find most (not all but most) of the up voted and awarded content to be trash or low value. Moving to financially incentivise that show Reddit really don't understand their own site.
I actually improved my reddit experience back in the day by blocking the top creators and checking that top list every few months to make sure it was current. Instantly better!
Applying gold and awards will hold posts on the frontpage even if they're downvoted to oblivion. They're likely getting rid of them as a way of manipulating the narrative.
I don't know if anyone here has anything as constructive as what they should have done, having reached this point in history. If I was suddenly dropped into spez's body, I do not have a clue what I would do other than completely back track the past 2 months and eat a literal hat with a fork and knife. Don't know if even that would work.
Was there any indication something like this was coming?
Also, I only learned last 1-2 months during the API fiasco that Reddit had some weird NFT thing going on.. Are they just trying to find anything that will stick?
It's rumored that Reddit is about to launch a new "creator program" that will pay Redditors for high-karma activity on the site. This change is probably meant to accommodate this new feature.
how could they even have the cashflow to support that?
I'm guessing new deals with advertisers. These changes will incentivize more neutral, advertiser-friendly comments on their platform. I imagine that's going to make them more lucrative to advertisers going forward, so that their ads are shown next to harmless memes instead of bad-faith political arguments in cat pic subreddits.
One thing I’ve seen a lot of is comments wishing that Lemmy/Kbin had support for some sort of gilding. So it’s obviously a feature that people enjoyed using which means Reddit just has to enshittify it. This is the way.
Absolutely! Server donations are good for a single instance but I think a service that allows users to purchase gold/awards and awards the particular instance (with funds) that they get used on would help fund the Fediverse as a whole. I imagine implementing something like that would not be simple but anything is better than injecting ads.
implementing something like that would not be simple
Especially with the idea that an instance a user calls home/registered on would have to be ok with allowing a donation link to go to the instance that the user you're "gilding" is on
Precisely. They were a fun thing to give out, and directly helped to pay for server time. I even liked how Reddit would tell you how much server time your awards gave to Reddit (which I think they've removed?).
100%, but the Federated nature would make this difficult, I'd imagine.
I'd love a way to simultaneously:
show someone I appreciate their comment
Help support an instance
Help support KBin development
But, outside of crypto, I don't see an easy way to make that happen and doing it through crypto would bring out the crypto bros and mega-anti crypto joe's in about equal numbers, which would suck (plus, who's to say that an instance admin even wants to deal with crypto to collect a few bucks).
@Ernest has transferred the existing Buy Me A Coffee money over to the server fund and from this point on we really can buy him a beer via Buy Me A Coffee which is cool!
I'm not Ernest but my guess is it gives us greater flexibility?
Like, some of us are already active on one or the other of those platforms, plus between them there are lots of different options for amount. I'd never heard of Liberapay but I like how it's a non-profit.
Well there are 49 subscribed people on patreon totaling $170/month. Lots of people probably already have accounts set up which makes it a very low threshold to join.
Meanwhile on librepay, arguably more philosophically suitable, there are 11 subscribers totaling $13/month.
Man, considering how many people I have seen saying how great it is to be able to pay, and asserting they are making donations, those are very low numbers.
Could be because it is less circulated. I had seen the coffee option previously but didn't realise the other 2 options had been setup until I came across this comment.
Yes haha. Constantly. I wouldn't be surprised if they're happy to be rid of the type of user who would move to the fediverse anyway. Maybe that was their plan all along.
Yep, and was proud to - let me support Reddit and good contributors.
I wonder if the exodus of people like myself brought this on - the drop in awards given may have been significant indicator or less engagement, so needed to muddy the waters?
Yeah, I bought gold a few times. I had no problem with "this content was so good it inspired me to give back a little to the free service we're all using."
I wouldn't mind some equivalent for the fediverse honestly. Let me donate to the home server of a user who's comment I thought was especially good.
I know you can donate directly, but I do think there was something about also making another user's day that felt good about the Gold system. The service gets some fuel in the tank and the comment author gets a little boost to their mood. It was nice.
I agree it got way too out of hand when they moved beyond Gold though.
Gold originally was fine imo. Then it got out of control with so many different medals, some free, some cheap, etc. They made it so confusing and basically every post on the front page had some sort of award. They made it confusing and cluttered… At least they realized it was dumb.
I remember at one point, Talklittle mentioned the addition of rewards, and how he was against them, which was convenient since Reddit didn't give third party apps access to them in the first place. I know at one point I was able to buy gold in RiF, but that was gone the moment that Reddit introduced all the other bullshit rewards.
I wonder if this isn’t a rev recognition play. If their accounting rules say they can’t take the revenue until the award is issued…I bet there’s a lot of money sitting on the table they can apply to their books with this play. It’s basically the same play as expiring unused gift cards…
That's actually an excellent point, but it has the chance to backfire spectacularly if they can't IPO or come up with a more higher earning replacement before the end of the next fiscal year. So I totally expect them to fuck it up
This seems like the dumbest decision imaginable. Users are flocking to alternatives, many of those who haven't don't trust you, and you're trying to become profitable … so you delete the stuff people paid for without any sort of replacement. What a genius ideaǃ Making the platform less unique and giving the middle finger to the people who give you money in one go!
There's no way a human adult is running this company. It has to be a council of toddlers run by a keyboard-smashing orangutan. At this point, they might as well start encouraging bots and karma farming. Maybe even pay people to do it!
