[mvdtnz]

> The amount of mindless "me too!" and "here's how that works /confidentlyincorrect"

This is what gets me about all the people lately claiming that the only way to get good Google results is to append site:reddit.com - I have spent enough time looking at Reddit threads to know I would never trust them for important information. People who post on Reddit are very often just completely wrong, and often that wrongness becomes a meme (in the original sense of the word) that propagates through the site for literally years. New users read the confidently wrong information, take it as gospel and spread it to other new users.

[MostlyStable]

1) Compared to what? It's really important to compare those reddit results to elsewhere and not the hypothetical "best" answer. Yeah, reddit answers are often not great, but in my experience, the rest of google search has, over the past 10 years, gone to complete and utter shit. If I don't already know where to look (and just want google to get me there faster), 99% of my results are going to be useless blogspam.

2) It's even more important to have an understanding of the _kinds_ of things reddit is good at answering, and which communities provide good answers to those questions. Reddit is so big that there are good and bad versions of almost everything.

[mvdtnz]

1) As always it depends on the query. For categories like cars/engines, gardening/landscaping and DIY stuff I've found that a Bing search often outperforms Google because it returns a dedicated section for internet discussions that isn't focused completely on Reddit. Here's an example of that section from a search about manifolds for an old engine[0].

There is a TON of (actually good) community discussion on such topics on "the old internet" as long as it doesn't need to be timely.

For topics that need more timeliness, I don't have a good answer. The internet in general is so enshittified that maybe Reddit is the only good answer when the alternative is AI-generated garbage.

2) In my experience, for factual information, it's just too much of a minefield. Try finding actually accurate information on Reddit about Roundup/glyphosate, for example. Compare what you find to the actual published research on the topic. It is very hard to find correct information on this topic on Reddit, and where you do see it, it will be downvoted to invisibility. [0] https://imgur.com/a/8NNcwTJ

[nitwit005]

For a subject like pesticides that is both emotionally fraught, and the subject of multi-billion dollar lawsuits, I'm genuinely not sure you can find accurate information anywhere. People are careful to say things like "not supported by credible science", because the industry has paid for some of the research.

[JohnFen]

> reddit answers are often not great, but in my experience, the rest of google search has, over the past 10 years, gone to complete and utter shit.

Fascinating.

I've read so many comments here about how people search reddit specifically in order to get better results, but I've never understood this. I don't find reddit to be better enough for that sort of thing to be worth going to reddit as a first choice.

Perhaps this explains it? I stopped using Google search a few years back because I find it hard to get to useful sites using it.

Are people comparing reddit-specific searches to general Google search results? That would be the explanation, because if I had to chose between the two, I'd go with a reddit-first approach, too.

[KnobbleMcKnees]

It really depends what you're looking for answers to.

If you're looking for more trustworthy product reviews than the ones on an Amazon product page, or you're looking for how to fix an obscure problem with your 3d printer, it's damn reliable. Having the opportunity for open and anonymous conversation on these things increases the chance of meaningful discussion.

For the former, Google search results are a hodge podge of bought-and-paid for "best of" sites, and for the latter dominated by ancient niche forum posts and shitty Quora answers.

Half of the Internet is now soulless self promotion and devious attempts to advertise without you knowing you're being advertised to.

So two cheers to Reddit, frankly. We could do a hell of a lot worse.

[JohnFen]

> If you're looking for more trustworthy product reviews than the ones on an Amazon product page

I totally believe that! But since I personally don't look for product reviews on the internet at all (and absolutely wouldn't look on Amazon), I wouldn't really know.

All I'm saying is that for the sorts of things I tend to search for, anyway, finding good resources on the web isn't that hard, so I never really understood why people prefer to search reddit (unless they already are reddit users anyway, of course).

[KnobbleMcKnees]

Without knowing what those things are this is a rather fruitless discussion.

[jameson71]

It's really good for home type technical questions too. Like a stack overflow for plex or handyman type things for people who want to scan text and not watch a half hour youtube.

What are you using instead of google search?

[JohnFen]

DDG, although I think I'll be switching to Kagi in the future.

> for people who want to scan text and not watch a half hour youtube.

I never use YouTube videos for that sort of thing because I don't really learn well from videos. I'm a text kind of guy. But even for those sorts of things, I never have a problem finding good resources on the web, so I have no reason to have to go to reddit for them.

That's just me, though. It's not a criticism of reddit, just a preference. Reddit is just not my kind of place, so I like to avoid it when I can.

[trts]

it's a fairly common and incredible experience for me to see people on reddit assert the most inane drivel that collect hundreds or thousands of upvotes and enthusiastic agreement.

It makes me feel some combination of

1. Reddit is flooded with bots or brigades that seem to have cryptic agendas

2. My own reality is really far afield and the internet is bursting that bubble OR

3. The present young adult generation exists in a seriously orthogonal reality and absolutely sweeping societal changes are on the horizon (as may already be becoming evident)

I still find a lot of pleasant discourse on the smaller subreddits. But it's an absolute shock to visit some of the larger communities sometimes.

[TheNewsIsHere]

I think #3 is closest to the mark, but I don’t think it’s caged to young adults.

For example, if you were to look anywhere on Reddit and found yourself in a thread that just barely, tangentially, almost-not-in-this-plane-of-reality touches on something related to law, a hundred people will show up to give you all sorts of the most inane and dangerous legal advice.

Granted, for something like legal advice you: 1) shouldn’t go Reddit; and 2) should search for an attorney. That said, there are (were?) some places on Reddit where you could find advice or discussion attached to the reality shared by the rest of us. But that isn’t the current draw of the site to the masses.

I’m one of the people who (until this past week) used Reddit in a technical capacity.

That shouldn’t be taken as “I get my solutions from Reddit.” Rather, I posted and consumed niche technical information for unusual problems. There were (are?) a boatload of smaller, vendor specific, etc subreddits that _did_ (do?) have smart people who collaborate or rubber ducky tricky issues.

Most of Reddit is not and was not that.

And as I type that, I realize I must apologize for sort of hijacking your reply with a response to the parent comment. I’ll leave this and have prepended a direct response to the points you raise and added a reasonable segue.

[samtho]

> Granted, for something like legal advice you: 1) shouldn’t go Reddit; and 2) should search for an attorney.

Counterpoint, not everyone has access to an attorney, a mechanic, a doctor (sadly), tradesperson, or any number of expensive professionals when someone just needs to know if they can ignore something, can fix it themself, or if they should seek out professional advice. These communities can be of great help to people who just need to guided to the next step.

[TheNewsIsHere]

Wholeheartedly agreed.

[castlecrasher2]

I also avoid the larger communities. The value in reddit is having a number of doors to open and shut at will. Can I find a better place for discussion in a specific forum? Probably, but reddit is great for being able to visit and consult with many different groups.

[smackeyacky]

This is the crux of the problem and why free moderation doesn't scale. Communities simply can't exceed a particular size without attracting chuds, and smaller communities self regulate because "being a member" of something useful is valuable.

Online discussions communities since Usenet always suffer the same problem. They become useful, attract too many users of the wrong kind and die. Reddit will be no exception.

[soundsgoodtome]

4. Most people are idiots.

The older I get, the more I go with #4

[ttctciyf]

> assert the most inane drivel

Thank goodness that never happens here!

[hotpotamus]

Number 3 just seems like a fancy way of saying that you're getting older. Not that I disagree; I'm also getting older.

[throwaway22032]

The Reddit algorithm of upvotes and downvotes means that, if >51% of voters agree with something, it's visible. If <49% do, it's at the bottom of the page or hidden.

This makes basically anything even remotely controversial within the specific demographic of the site invisible to reddit users.

[andybak]

I’m 52 and frequent a mix of large and small subreddits.

Can you elaborate?

[cityhall]

One thing it's still useful for is getting user reviews that actually tell you if a product is junk or has recently been replaced with an inferior version. Store sites and review pages make it too easy for companies to get negative reviews hidden.

[xapata]

> People who post on Reddit are very often just completely wrong, and often that wrongness becomes a meme (in the original sense of the word) that propagates through the site for literally years.

Isn't that just a microcosm of the internet and society in general?

[mvdtnz]

The internet I came from (in the days of discussion forums) didn't suffer this problem because there were no internet points attached to posts, and posts were ordered oldest to newest. Incorrect information was called out. On Reddit, the "right kind" of incorrect information is upvoted and boosted to the top, and anyone calling out this misinformation is downvoted.

[itairal]

The worst part to me is the binary nature of internet points. Up or down. No difference between something one simply doesn't agree with vs utter and complete bullshit.

On the other hand I am not sure what the old internet forums I loved would look like if you scaled up the users 100X and then linked all these random forums together so one username interacted across message boards. That would have basically been a disaster and internet points would not have been the major problem.

[rightbyte]

Internet points are fine but the sort by votes order messes up any interesting discussion if people use downvotes as disagree buttons.

[dmichulke]

I use reddit to search for a diverse set of options (= many possible solutions), not for facts (wikipedia), code (stackoverflow) or how-tos (YouTube).

Google only gives you a million times the same top n solutions iff your keywords are unique enough.