• 2 Posts
  • 26 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
Cake day: July 7th, 2023
  • null@zerobytes.monstertoReddit@lemmy.world•Reddit Takes Over Popular Subreddit Amid Moderator Protest
    116·
    1 year ago

    The Reddit debacle continues as it replaces the r/malefashionadvice subreddit moderators following their refusal to reopen to the public.

    Reddit followed through on its threat to take over subreddits if they did not reopen to the public with its takeover of r/malefashionadvice on Thursday. Prior to closing down in protest of Reddit’s API price changes. The subreddit was one of the biggest on the platform that was still engaged in the protest, boasting more than five million subscribers.

    Reddit reached out to moderators telling them if they didn’t reopen their subreddits they would be in violation of the company’s moderator code and could be replaced. “We more or less have been expecting the removal for the past few days,” one former moderator of r/malefashionadvice, who asked to go by “Walker,” told The Verge.

    A Reddit administrator warned r/malefashionadvice it would be replaced if it didn’t reopen and a month later, it stayed true to its word and took over the platform. The subreddit originally had three moderators but was replaced on Thursday with just one, ModCodeofConduct. Reddit users can once again browse the content on r/malefashionadvice, but it will be in a restricted mode that prohibits all but certain users from making new posts.

    Although ModCodeofConduct has taken over the subreddit, the mod posted a call for people to volunteer to become a moderator for the page on Friday, telling people to comment on the post to volunteer.

    ModCodeofConduct has also taken over other subreddits including r/ShittyLifeProTips, r/AccidentalRenaissance, r/oldbabies, r/fordtransit, and others.

    Major Reddit moderators went dark last month in protest of the company’s announcement that it would be raising its API prices, saying it was necessary because Big Tech companies like Microsoft and Google are using its data to train AI models. The site’s API allows other companies to use data from Reddit to bolster their own products and services, but the change would mean a large surcharge for premium access.

    Nearly 9,000 subreddits temporarily shut down on June 12 in protest, but in a group statement, moderators said, “Others will go away permanently unless the issue is adequately addressed since many moderators aren’t able to put in the work they do with the poor tools available through the official app,” The Guardian reported. It continued, “This isn’t something any of us do lightly: we do what we do because we love Reddit, and we truly believe this change will make it impossible to keep doing what we love.”

  • null@zerobytes.monstertoReddit@lemmy.world•Reddit is bringing back r/Place at perhaps the worst possible time
    127·
    1 year ago

    Reddit is bringing back r/Place — a collaborative project where individual users can edit pixels on a giant canvas — at a time when users are still furious over things like Reddit’s API pricing that forced beloved third-party apps to shut down, the company’s decision to remove chat history from before 2023 with hardly any warning, and its recent announcement that it would be sunsetting the current system to give Reddit Gold. The 2023 version of r/Place kicks off on Thursday, July 20th.

    As you might expect, users are already using the announcement post to air their grievances toward the company. The current top comment in reply to the post just says “fuck u/spez” (“spez” is CEO Steve Huffman’s Reddit username), and many of the other comments say only “API,” so I wouldn’t be surprised to see that sentiment show up in some way on this year’s r/Place canvas.

    I think even Reddit might be aware that the timing isn’t great. In a short announcement video, the company’s tagline for the event is “right place, wrong time.” In a different post, a Reddit admin (employee) shared a series of pushed dates for when r/Place would kick off — it was supposed to go live at the beginning of April but kept getting delayed:

    April 1st (the previous two r/Place events were April Fools’ Day events)
Then April 20th, two days after Reddit first announced the API changes (but didn’t announce pricing)
Then May 4th
Then June 15th, which was in the thick of the subreddit blackouts and coincidentally became the same day we had a contentious interview with Huffman
Then June 23rd, which was one week before apps were set to shut down
And now, July 20th

    Past r/Place experiments took place in 2017 and 2022. (Josh Wardle, who would later go on to create and then sell Wordle, thought up the idea for r/Place, according to Newsweek.) The final canvases for each (2017, 2022) are honestly fascinating pieces of work, with things like art, country flags, memes, and video game iconography all smashed together into colorful pixel collages.

    For the 2023 edition, Reddit is letting subreddit moderators “pin” coordinates on the canvas to help community members more easily navigate to certain areas. While that does sound useful, I imagine some communities will use the feature to help focus their protest efforts.

    Reddit declined to comment. It’s unclear exactly how long this year’s version of r/Place will be open to contributions; the 2017 version took place over 72 hours, while the 2022 edition was made over four days.

    By the way, this announcement helped me solve where the ugly pixelated Reddit app logo is from: you can see it in Reddit’s r/Place announcement video. For some reason, that video also includes pixelated images of a fire in a garbage can.