this post was submitted on 11 Jun 2023
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It's one thing to test a new idea or a UX tweak or similar on a small portion of users - but just turning off a key way to access your service is so just so weird to me. How many of Reddit's decisions at this point are some version of, "hey, how angry do they get? What can we get away with?"
People need to understand that this is about tracking your eyeballs. Reddit viewed on a webpage does not provide the metadata they want. What metadata does the app provide? Things you wouldn't think about wanting as a human, but the aggregate is very valuable.
Stuff like how long did you watch that video Ad? Where did you click on screen and at what time? What content were you viewing and what course of action did you take to get there? Web viewing only shows the landing page you arrived on reddit from and the exit page that took you away from reddit. Performing these actions in the app provides metadata cookie crumbs like a trail of roach shit to every single thing you've done on reddit in micro activities.
I'm not sure. I've worked at companies using amplitude and hotjar that can record all click event and sessions on web
Users can block those with extensions so the data isn't as reliable
That's probably a big part. Web browsers can do ad blocking. Within the official Reddit app that's way more difficult.
Funneling the herd into the slaughterhouse.
It sure seems like half the herd has wandered off.
It is not super difficult to do the same type of blocking with a router on software like OpenWRT. This can easily block all of the 3rd party ads type junk. The thing I can't quite figure out is what they are able to do on their server connection. It seems like they are able to setup their own proxy and impact other traffic on the same network when they should be far more sandboxed, but I can't prove that.
Someone REALLY needs to make fully open source and transparent mobile hardware and put Qualcomm under the bus... on a high speed looping track. We have no idea what is really possible under the hood on any existing mobile device. Both the processor and the modem are mostly black boxes. Even with the best custom ROMs like Graphene OS, the whole premise is based on developing a verifiable chain of trust on top of untrusted hardware we don't control.
The thing people fail to put together is that this is an issue of ownership; theft of ownership. Now we are seeing the first layers of neo digital feudalism emerging as a result of the theft.
that is not something average people even know about, or would have the skills to attempt. not even close.
Users can block those on desktop without issue. On mobile it's a bit harder so most people I know don't even if they use ublock or something on their PCs/laptops (though that is of course only anecdotal).
So if anything if that was the issue they should've shut off support for the desktop version LOL /s
It's not as common to push users to apps on desktop, but its a tried-and-true practice on mobile. I'm sure companies would do it if they could, but app stores and app lockin aren't as strong on desktop as on mobile
It's a bizzare move though, given that basically every other social media in the world doesn't block mobile browsers.
Not blocking but LinkedIn pushes mobile browsers towards their app.
Facebook infamously does for Messenger. But yes, I think it's a sign of their desperation.
Bruh, I agree. I'm super interested to see the fallout of the community from this. I know it's super easy to say "fuck /u/spez", but how many people will truly pull through to delete their accounts and/or stop using reddit?
The whole blackout thing is super interesting, and to my knowledge it's the biggest protest of it's kind since Reddit hit the mainstream. I can't imagine it kills Reddit soon though. It's just the start of a brain-drain that will make Reddit lose relevancy over the next 5 to 10 years, and they'll wonder where they went wrong. Even I'll probably keep my alt account there, but the days of actually contributing will end for many.
But also fuck spez ;)
Already deleted any accounts I had. Overwrote all comments with this tool too.
https://github.com/j0be/PowerDeleteSuite
@gravalicious @Sintamo
Make sure it actually overwrote all your comments. PowerDeleteSuite doesn't respect the edit rate limit. I used a fork which runs much slower but respects the limit.
Also, it's a good idea to wait several days between the editing and deleting your account. Many users on reddit were suggesting that reddit holds on to pre-edit text for a while. Obviously archives hold onto it forever, but if your goal is to deny your content to reddit, that's orthogonal.
Gotta weigh in here and say overwriting comments like that can hurt the end user more than it hurts Reddit. A lot of traffic to Reddit is intentional, with posts and comments showing up in search results from ddg/google. I know I've found my own posts from troubleshooting the same issue years later. Sure, delete/overwrite comparatively useless comments and posts, but leave up other useful content and use an ad blocker instead. That will hurt them more than deleting content, but still allow others to find the info they need.
It's true that it will hurt people long term but it will drive traffic away more than deleting the inane stuff. No website like that should be such a central repo when it's unstable like this. The internet has survived link rot and info loss before.
It's so completely wild and backwards. Imagine your not a reddit user, but a search leads you to a reddit link, and you're on your phone. You see all this stuff about downloading the app instead, and you're just going to bail, never reading the post. If there was no friction, they may have converted a new user.
They act like everyone already uses reddit and the users are so addicted they'll put up with anything.
To be honest, this may actually be true for a significant portion of the userbase.
I would have thought so of myself, but yet, here we are
These federated let me things really really remind me of the way Reddit used to be about a decade ago. And frankly, now that I found the Jerboa app, I really don't miss Reddit at all.
I just wanted to find a place where I could scroll around and chat with other nerds. And that's basically what Lemmy is.
Quora, basically.
I don't think I've ever successfully read one of those, because Google brings me to the site and then it demands I log in. They even go so far as to blur all the content. It's really really stupid.
It's funny because this is a huge issue with Pinterest and googling images, so many people automatically add -pinterest to their search terms so it's completely blocked from the search results. Wonder if someday that'll be reddit too.
They’re going to do the Instagram thing where you can view a teaser but then it forces you to the app.
Mean there were times when I was logged out of Reddit and was trying looking up something on mobile and the constant badgering to install the app just had me tell it to flip off and I looked elsewhere instead. Lot of people tend to do things based on how convenient it is for them and if they go ahead with this, sure maybe some will download the app but a lot of other people will just get fed up and stop, particularly if they were using the browser version so they didn't have to deal with the app in the first place.
It seems like a lot of users are. I deleted my Reddit account (for whatever good that does) but have gone back to peek a few times - very few people seem to care. The black out, the app shenanigans, the power-mad mods; it’s just a minor inconvenience. API, IPO, VC, what’s that? Just gimme my crude humor and canned outrage!!
Yeah. There are a ridiculous amount of users that just use the official app and don’t really care about 3PAs or the whole API situation.
It’s a shame. I remember the old Reddit before all the redesign and other crap they added.
Most active users though are lurking voters only, or not logged in at all, and don't comment/post. When they leave, it won't be as obvious. And the more contributing users leave, the more the only ones left and talking will be the ones who don't care.
I think a lot of people are riding the sinking ship all the way down and planning to bail on the 30th, when the apps are actually banned, too. Probably enjoying the drama of it and not realizing they could be enjoying the drama of it from, like, over here on dry land instead.
But yeah. There'll be people who put up with it for now, or who join after and missed the whole controversy, or who straight up don't care at all.
I think there'll be these initial waves of people who can see the writing on the wall leaving, then after that there'll be a steady trickle of people abandoning ship over time, with spikes whenever the next outrageous thing happens, and the whole thing will collapse gradually, perhaps over years.
Although, people have been saying that since Ellen Pao and Voat... 😅
I think you're right to a point, but also, the whole fragmented fediverse thing is going to have to... at least be simplified if the "lurking voter" mainstream are going to end up here.
Me (enthusiastically):
"It's federated, so you have to choose an instance! They're all different, but they can all talk to each other! Some of them have different rules. Oh, and they can all have their own 'videos' community, so you have to decide which ones you want to follow. Also some of the instances are kbin and some are Lemmy, but most likely the website you log into won't be called either of those things. And if you don't curate your own frontpage (which doesn't even show your subs by default) you'll just see everything at once!"
Average Internet user (starting a new Facebook account because they forgot their password):
"reddit dot com has funny gifs on it"
The more I look at this mess, the more I see elements of speedrunning. Reddit is really trying very hard to loose as many users as possible as fast as possible. It’s as if there’s a competition between Reddit and Twitter.
It seems to me that they are telling the investors that they might shrink but what is left will be on a much more profitable basis moving forward.