cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/37870004
reddit got bad because spez (the reddit admin) restricted API access to the platform for third-party apps, such that people would be forced to use the official app or web UI, both of which display advertisement and collect user data (e.g. scroll behavior).
the reason why this happened is because reddit is a for-profit company and tries to extract money out of the userbase, at the expense of the users.
another example of a bad decision that reddit made was to push a lot of ragebait (“Am I The Asshole?”) because company shareholders want to see “engagement numbers” go up, and if somebody writes an angry reply to a post, that’s “engagement”. but it makes you angry at the stupidity of the “Asshole”, so it makes your day worse. that is another example how reddit makes money at the expense of the users.
size (number of monthly active users) is not what made reddit bad. commercialization is.
we should probably get rid of the “don’t make lemmy grow, it will ruin the platform if we grow” idea.
Yep, and if you defederate from too many sites, or from all sites that don’t share your values 100%, your instance starts to die because it’s not interesting to be on it if you’re outside the groupthink.
I like that, it’s a good mechanism for keeping things fresh and interesting. It’s also why I have several accounts on different servers, because I like to see hexbear stuff but also about 5% of the stuff that ml mods don’t like.
Edit: actually, while we’re on the subject: I’m incredibly old so I still like the “information should be free” bullshit that the internet used to be able to run on, is there any instance that only censors people for spamming and CSAM and information-free politics trolling?
Like, all they care about politically is if you’re willing to admit that facts are facts and don’t want to kill or chattel enslave entire sections of society?