Reddit protest updates: news on the apps shutting down and Reddit’s fights with mods - The Verge
Reddit communities went dark to protest recent changes.
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Have barely been on there since it started besides to visit subs that havent even attempted to move yet, from what I have heard Reddit is definitely worse now with how many people have left, is that everyone elses perspective as well.
I was under the impression not much had changed because a small minority used 3rd party apps tbh.
Vocal minority though, surely?
I’ve visited a few times on Desktop (old.reddit) since the shutdown and the rate of new content seems to have slowed down quite drastically.
Twitter metrics used to point to 90% of the content coming from 10% of the users.
If Reddit is similar, it makes sense to assume that many of the very active users were on 3rd party apps (to improve the basic experience, moderation etc.) so those being unavailable could put them off entirely (I know I’m using Reddit a fraction of what I once was).
I believe the rule of thumb is the 90:9:1 ratio:
Not that I don’t believe you, but do you have a source about that? Quite literally for the sake of my curiosity/further reading
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule
Seems like in 2014, a peer-reviewed study confirmed that it's pretty close to accurate:
A 2014 peer-reviewed paper entitled "The 1% Rule in Four Digital Health Social Networks: An Observational Study" empirically examined the 1% rule in health-oriented online forums. The paper concluded that the 1% rule was consistent across the four support groups, with a handful of "Superusers" generating the vast majority of content.[6] A study later that year, from a separate group of researchers, replicated the 2014 van Mierlo study in an online forum for depression.[7] Results indicated that the distribution frequency of the 1% rule fit followed Zipf's Law, which is a specific type of power law.
There's a Wikipedia page about it with all sorts of links to rabbit holes you can go down!
Oh wow thanks for the reply! I’ve never read about this topic at all so this will definitely be fun to tumble down
Indeed. Not many people hopped ship, but those who did were disproportionately power users, mods, and other content generators. Because of that, I've heard that Reddit content generation has somewhat slowed.
I hadn't heard that stag from Twitter, but I really do hope that is how it is on reddit and that the content generating users have begin making the switch. Sadly, I think some of reddit recent rise in popularity attracted some folks there only for views so they'll probably stay. Hopefully their content isn't much to miss.
I’ve a feeling you’re not wrong about attracting users who’re solely after notoriety, though I’ve a feeling it’ll only further water down meaningful content and discussion on the platform as that no longer necessarily brings with it much in the way of karma
Traffic impacts will be clearer in coming months. But in my view, the amount of noise is higher.
Looking at the popular posts and even my front page, the quality has subjectively gone down. Small subs are virtually the same, but that's not where Reddit wants to make their money.
I have found that it is actually the small subs that are the most important. The big subs were very easily replaced as it was easy to build a new community from scratch. It's the small ones that are difficult, and also the ones that pop up in search engines the most.
So many used the excuse to not participate or reopen with the explanation of we are too small to matter, but it is because the community is small to begin with that it is the ones that has the biggest pull back to reddit. Like for example if you search how to play taiko no tatsujin on pc it's many hits of reddit that just pop up. Especially if you are looking for how to set up custom songs.
Agreed. The large subs content you can get anywhere. News, memes, made up stories, random questions with the same set of answer. Sure once you are already on reddit you might aswell consume it there for convenience, but that isn't that special.
The small niche subs are what makes it unique. There is a reason why many people have come to add "reddit" to their google searches to find solutions to their problems.
Yeah, I had already unsubscribed from all the default subs long ago. That starts making me curious what type of subs long time reddit users who ended up leaving had avoided themselves and how long their list of filters blocking subs from showing up on /r/all were.
I can’t speak for others, but I literally never looked at r/all. I went directly to specific subs, mostly small and/or specialized. I had been on the site for something like ten years, and while I wasn’t online every day, when I was online, I was talking to people rather than lurking. For me, the whole reason I had to leave is that I went there to engage, and now that the company has made the “business decision “ to become a shithole, I no longer want to engage. So I have taken my 100% of my engagement here. I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a link between being an active participant and feeling upset enough to leave. If I had been a lurker, it wouldn’t have mattered as much to me that I no longer feel comfortable contributing to spez’s data hoard.
[edit: also, as someone who was there as much to connect with cool people as I was to talk about particular topics, I am not missing specific subs nearly as much as I expected. I am getting more or less the same emotional payoff here as I did from Reddit at its best.]
Speed at which some communities have grown over few weeks has been pretty impressive that some of the subs that never migrated I'm not missing anymore. Of course there are a few that doesn't have much people or any activity, but it's been better than I expected.
What I’ve found is that while not all the topics I went to Reddit for are fully represented, the ones that are active here have good communities, and I am finding the same kind of people, although we might be talking about different things. I don’t really mind focusing on different topics, since I have a broad range of interests. It’s not like I was on every single interest subreddit all the time.
It's not just how many left, it's who left.
some subs are still lively. To be expected, however Lemmy has proven a viable alternative with enough activity to keep me sated, and it's clearly still growing. Every day a new community pops up that reflects a counterpart on Reddit and the remaining niches are quickly being filled right here.
And those communities haven’t a fraction of the drama and hostility. Mainly because they’re small and new, but that’s why you move to a new site, anyways.
The UFC and MMA subs haven't moved yet despite there being a few communities on lemmy. I still go to reddit for those.
Lack of care by sports fans is the least surprising. It is after all a group that still pays for cable and puts up with ads after all. They are very addicted to the product.
It's the gaming and pc subs that I ended up disappointed by, but then those communities ended up having good growth here without need for Reddit mods pushing migration.
Do you know of any Lemmy communities that post gaming clips? I see a ton about gaming discussions and gaming news but none with gameplay.
Game discussions and news was all I followed back on reddit, so hadn't searched out gameplay clip focused ones. So unaware if that exists on lemmy.
I’m sure those will comes in time too I guess
I think the giant default subs are the same but I’ve definitely noticed less activity on my smaller niche interest subs (the whole point of reddit for me) since the apps shut down.
That's right. There's been a downward trend with the quality of content, especially on the tech front. What's seemingly unaffected are location-based subs.
![[The Verge] Reddit protest updates: news on the apps shutting down and Reddit’s fights with mods](https://lemmy.ml/pictrs/image/cbc8631e-0e83-4b13-b41e-c618f3488cec.jpeg?format=webp&thumbnail=196)