Proof besides Reddit’s CEO considering biometrics to validate humans to combat bot spam?
While our beliefs on this topic are irrelevant, it matters to those who might sign contracts with Reddit for their data for LLM training, otherwise they can generate slop to train on internally versus paying for Reddit’s slop from bot accounts. Reddit has limited enterprise value based on their low quality ads business, so proving humans are human is existential to the business.
Their only value is capturing adults discussing various topics and selling access to that data as a product at the present moment.
Reddit is being spammed by AI bots, and it’s all Reddit’s fault - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44417497 - June 2025
Unauthorised AI Bots on Reddit are Eroding Sociality - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43821600 - April 2025
Reddit is full of bots: thread reposted comment by comment, 10 months later - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40211010 - April 2024
AI Is Poisoning Reddit to Promote Products and Game Google With 'Parasite SEO' - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40136680 - April 2024
Is it me or is Reddit mostly bots now? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42258993 - November 2024
Has anyone noticed how overrun by bots Reddit has become? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41443633 - September 2024
Detecting Russian Bots on Reddit - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19719569 - April 2019