this post was submitted on 12 Jun 2023
419 points (100.0% liked)

Technology

37712 readers
337 users here now

A nice place to discuss rumors, happenings, innovations, and challenges in the technology sphere. We also welcome discussions on the intersections of technology and society. If it’s technological news or discussion of technology, it probably belongs here.

Remember the overriding ethos on Beehaw: Be(e) Nice. Each user you encounter here is a person, and should be treated with kindness (even if they’re wrong, or use a Linux distro you don’t like). Personal attacks will not be tolerated.

Subcommunities on Beehaw:


This community's icon was made by Aaron Schneider, under the CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Hey everyone. If you want to post links or discuss the Reddit blackout, please localize it to this thread in order to keep things tidy!

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 150 points 1 year ago (6 children)

Reddit has been going through some issues for many on Monday, with the outage happening the same day as thousands of subreddits going dark to protest the site’s new API pricing terms.

According to Reddit, the blackout is responsible for the problems. “A significant number of subreddits shifting to private caused some expected stability issues, and we’ve been working on resolving the anticipated issue,” spokesperson Tim Rathschmidt tells The Verge.

[–] PascalSausage@beehaw.org 133 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Too much load? Reddit is down.

Not enough load? Believe it or not, also down.

[–] ApathyMoose@beehaw.org 17 points 1 year ago

Want Free API? Straight to down status.

Want cheaper API? Also straight to down status

Not enough people on Reddit because of protests? Also straight to down status

[–] CelebrationMassive87@slrpnk.net 12 points 1 year ago (2 children)

This comment is so good an upvote won’t do justice (without awards, a classic comment such as this now has some merit.. it’s a new day boys & girls, a good day)

[–] PascalSausage@beehaw.org 9 points 1 year ago

If Beehaw offered awards I would actually buy them, at least the money would be going towards keeping the lights on for a project that isn't actively trying to screw over users for profit.

[–] smellythief@beehaw.org 4 points 1 year ago

Give them some gold. Oh wait…

[–] deephurting@beehaw.org 3 points 1 year ago

Rebelling moderators, we have a special jail for rebelling moderators.

[–] lunarshot@beehaw.org 2 points 1 year ago

thank you, this comment made my day

[–] Crotaro@beehaw.org 18 points 1 year ago

Whatever causes the website to have trouble, I'm all for it, right now.

I already wondered if I got lightning-banned for sending too many API requests in a short time, when I used a script to auto-edit all my comments and text-posts.

[–] setsneedtofeed@beehaw.org 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

When Reddit forcibly opens everything back up:

knock knock

“Who’s there?”

”Mods. Hired mods.”

“Hired mods?”

[–] Gork@beehaw.org 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

"Wait, you all are getting paid?"

[–] setsneedtofeed@beehaw.org 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If the volunteer mods hold their ground and force Reddit corporate to oust them, Reddit would need to step in to fill the void.

[–] agressivelyPassive@feddit.de 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They'll find some people.

The reality is, not having (good enough) mods will take a while to really hurt the bottom line. Subs will slowly deteriorate.

But I'm 100% sure, within a few weeks you can establish a new order of more servile mods.

[–] TechyDad@beehaw.org 5 points 1 year ago

People on Reddit complain about the mods enough as it is. (And I include myself in that. I've had some less than stellar mod encounters in the past.) However, if Reddit were to force out existing mods and replace them with mods willing to toe the company line (and possibly ban people for mentioning the blackout, complaining about Reddit, or mentioning alternatives), it would just result in more user dissatisfaction.

Reddit won't go out overnight. There are too many people who post there. However, this could turn into a snowball effect. Rebelling mods are replaced by bootlickers. Dissent is crushed in order to make it seem like everything is hunky dory before the IPO. Power users flee to alternatives like Lemmy. Slowly, normal users hear that some of their favorite content is on this new service and sign up. Reddit usage drops little by little until it's limping around as a shell of its former self.

[–] mizmoose@beehaw.org 5 points 1 year ago

Reddit has an annual "moderator summit", a rah! rah! yay for moderators! event for moderators, mostly of large or super large subreddits.

At last year's summit, Spez gave his 'keynote' talk where among other things he claimed that they were researching ways to pay moderators for their work, by giving them a cut of ... something. It was all sort of wonky and nebulous and likely just something he thought of that morning in the shower.

[–] LemmyAtem@beehaw.org 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

A significant number of subreddits shifting to private caused some expected stability issues, and we’ve been working on resolving the anticipated issue.

My hypothesis is that it's probably because so much of Reddit posting is automated by their own bot network now that they DDOS'd themselves trying to auto-post to subs that are suddenly locked. Like they didn't even bother tracking which subs would be blacking out and like...write exceptions to their post schedule.

[–] ProcurementCat@feddit.de 1 points 1 year ago

I bet their shitty bots intended to inflate comments and content couldn't be switched off in time for the blackouts, still sending requests and DDoS'ing their own site.