Reddit and its CEO Steve Huffman seem to be taking a page out of the Mafia’s playbook by actively threatening and intimidating moderators of subreddits to open their subreddits, or else bad things will happen to them. Via The Verge:
Reddit appears to be ramping up the pressure on moderators to open communities that closed in the blackout protest against recently announced platform changes. A Reddit admin — an employee of Reddit — has told unpaid volunteer moderators of a subreddit that the “expectation here is that communities reopen,” according to a message shared publicly by a moderator of r/DIY.
The pressure worked. The community was closed, but it reopened on Thursday, and a mod said that fears of Reddit actions forced the team’s hand: “We’re re-opening because if we don’t, the mods that Reddit appoint may not care about the subreddit the way we do,” the mod wrote.
And:
We’ve seen messages from other moderators where the admin, ModCodeofConduct, uses similar rhetoric. To the moderators of r/homeimprovement the admin said that “to be very clear you cannot remain closed so we need to know if any mods here wish to participate in opening the community.”
To the moderators of r/harrypotter, the admin account wrote that “keeping the community closed is not an option” — even though users have voted for the subreddit to be private, according to a post from a r/harrypotter mod.
Here’s what’s really interesting about this story:
Reddit didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment. According to Reddit spokesperson Tim Rathschmidt, “We’ll no longer comment on hearsay, unsubstantiated claims, or baseless accusations from The Verge. We’ll be in touch as corrections are needed.” In the absence of corrections, then, you can assume Reddit believes none are necessary.
What that says to me is that Reddit clearly feels that they are not only justified in taking this rather Mob like action, but they’re also okay with it being reported by people like The Verge. That says a lot about Reddit. And none of it good. Seeing as a lot of subreddits are still closed, and others are taking on other forms of protest like posting pictures or Tim Cook or posting porn to take money out of Reddit’s pockets, this isn’t going to go away. And I suspect that this API protest is about to head to a place where all out war between Reddit and subreddit mods and users will become a thing. And I think it’s well within the realm of possibility that Reddit will lose that fight as they now have more in common with a dollar store version of Vito Corleone these days.
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This entry was posted on June 23, 2023 at 8:29 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Reddit. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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Reddit Ramps Up Their Efforts To Threaten And Intimidate Subreddit Moderators
Reddit and its CEO Steve Huffman seem to be taking a page out of the Mafia’s playbook by actively threatening and intimidating moderators of subreddits to open their subreddits, or else bad things will happen to them. Via The Verge:
Reddit appears to be ramping up the pressure on moderators to open communities that closed in the blackout protest against recently announced platform changes. A Reddit admin — an employee of Reddit — has told unpaid volunteer moderators of a subreddit that the “expectation here is that communities reopen,” according to a message shared publicly by a moderator of r/DIY.
The pressure worked. The community was closed, but it reopened on Thursday, and a mod said that fears of Reddit actions forced the team’s hand: “We’re re-opening because if we don’t, the mods that Reddit appoint may not care about the subreddit the way we do,” the mod wrote.
And:
We’ve seen messages from other moderators where the admin, ModCodeofConduct, uses similar rhetoric. To the moderators of r/homeimprovement the admin said that “to be very clear you cannot remain closed so we need to know if any mods here wish to participate in opening the community.”
To the moderators of r/harrypotter, the admin account wrote that “keeping the community closed is not an option” — even though users have voted for the subreddit to be private, according to a post from a r/harrypotter mod.
Here’s what’s really interesting about this story:
Reddit didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment. According to Reddit spokesperson Tim Rathschmidt, “We’ll no longer comment on hearsay, unsubstantiated claims, or baseless accusations from The Verge. We’ll be in touch as corrections are needed.” In the absence of corrections, then, you can assume Reddit believes none are necessary.
What that says to me is that Reddit clearly feels that they are not only justified in taking this rather Mob like action, but they’re also okay with it being reported by people like The Verge. That says a lot about Reddit. And none of it good. Seeing as a lot of subreddits are still closed, and others are taking on other forms of protest like posting pictures or Tim Cook or posting porn to take money out of Reddit’s pockets, this isn’t going to go away. And I suspect that this API protest is about to head to a place where all out war between Reddit and subreddit mods and users will become a thing. And I think it’s well within the realm of possibility that Reddit will lose that fight as they now have more in common with a dollar store version of Vito Corleone these days.
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This entry was posted on June 23, 2023 at 8:29 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Reddit. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.