[redmerchant2]

I caved in and briefly decided to see the front page. It’s jarring how barren it is.

Front page is filled with posts from 16 hours ago.

I know a vocal dissident claimed it didn’t matter but looks like the power law is kicking in.

When the 1% of creators mostly stop posting, the 90% of lurkers will have nothing to consume.

It’s still up in the air how much it’ll matter but I’m cautiously optimistic.

[ARandumGuy]

The problem from Reddit's perspective is that moderators hold a huge amount of power, and Reddit has very little leverage over these users.

Reddit is heavily reliant on moderators for basic functionality of the site. Reddit just doesn't have the staff to take over moderating even the top 100 subreddits. This is far more power then any subset of users for any other social media site, and the mods are using this power to try and enact change.

It's unclear how this will proceed. In the long term, I suspect Reddit will try and reduce moderator power so that this sort of protest can't really happen again. But right now, it's a matter of which party blinks first.

[ASinclair]

If they weren't adversarial to the moderators they would seem them as their golden goose. They've done what other social media platforms haven't and solved scaling moderation without having to pay the moderators.

[yanderekko]

Give me a break. If the boycotts caused 99% of subs to close the remaining 1% would still easily have enough content to keep the front page fresh, and the algorithm could adapt smoothly. The assertion that Reddit is actually already dead at this point is wildly premature.

[s_dev]

The front page material does look startlingly less 'interesting' than it does normally.

I think reddit will be die the same way 'The Simpsons' died -- we all know seasons 8-13 are the by far the most critically acclaimed and the 'soul' of the series. You could point to the next 20/30 seasons as proof of 'success' and maybe you've a point and I think the same will happen to reddit. It will probably grow for years after June 30th but it will be 'Zombie Reddit' just like 'Zombie Simpsons'.

Excellent watch on the Fall of the Simpsons: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqFNbCcyFkk

[yanderekko]

>The front page material does look startlingly less 'interesting' than it does normally.

Yeah, it's all a bunch of repetitive protest posts.

The self-aggrandizement of activists saying "we represent the actual value-generating members of this site and we are angry" borders on delusion. Sadly, powerusers/mods that are still participating are also being subjected to various forms of harassment, which could fuel a false perception of consensus.

[tyg13]

> The self-aggrandizement of activists saying "we represent the actual value-generating members of this site and we are angry" borders on delusion.

If that's the case, then where's all the content from users who aren't angry? Why is the front page filled with protest posts? If it's just self-aggrandizing delusion from a small subset of activists like you seem to be claiming, then surely there must be plenty of other users to generate content.

[yanderekko]

The delusion is not in thinking that there's some impact, but in thinking that you as an activist can speak for the collective voice of value-generating users of the site. There are plenty of other users generating content. Eventually when the topic gets stale the protest posts will fall off the front page. Barring more dramatic PR missteps from Reddit, in a week there will be no noticeable difference in the site experience to the average user.

The idea that only a special class of users can be motivated to take whatever Twitter screenshots or political ragebait articles and crosspost them to Reddit is laughable.

[tyg13]

> The idea that only a special class of users can be motivated to take whatever Twitter screenshots or political ragebait articles and crosspost them to Reddit is laughable.

The vast majority of Reddit users (myself included, if I'm being fair) are just there to lurk. If you actually pay attention to who's posting the majority of those screenshots, it will generally be the same set of dedicated users. You might be deluded into thinking this isn't the case, but I assure you, beyond a small 1% of users, there is very little valuable content being generated.

Beyond that, there is an even smaller and even more special class of users who are understandably pissed off: Moderators, who absolutely do real work that generates value. These people are the most pissed off. Call them activists if you like, but this response honestly sounds like whining to me. If you don't want these people using their power to control the front page, why don't you go start your own subreddit? Then you can enjoy the pleasure of doing hours of unpaid work just so other people can go look at your stupid screenshots (or whatever valueless content you apparently think Reddit is good for.)

[ARandumGuy]

While I can't verify redmerchant2's claim, I could absolutely imagine that the Reddit front page algorithm can't handle a large portion of the site going dark at once. Reddit can't code for every possible situation, and it's not surprising to see weird behavior during a weird situation.