Tag: Subreddits

Steam’s Subreddit Is Running An Excellent Protest

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As we’ve been covering, things are not going well over on Reddit at the moment, with the site’s ownership currently engaged in a running battle with readers and moderators. Users are so annoyed at attempts to monetise the site that they’re working through a variety of protests, but one of the larger gaming subreddits—r/steam, with 1.9 million subscribers—is now my favourite.

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We’ve seen blackouts, we’ve seen sites toggle their settings to NSFW (thus cutting off ad revenue), but r/steam—whose mods were threatened with removal if they didn’t reopen the subreddit after an initial blackout—has decided as a community that if they had to reopen, they were going to reopen with a purpose.

And that purpose, as PC Gamer point out, was to become the internet’s top destination for all things steam-related. And by that I don’t mean the PC’s preferred shopfront and launcher, but steam engines. Steam clouds. Steam tractors, steam-driven cars and academic books about steam.

Here, for example, is a classic “rate my setup” post, emphasis on classic:

In this post, a user has an important technical question they’re hoping the community can answer:

Just because there’s a protest going on doesn’t mean there isn’t anything to celebrate:

Like most gaming subreddits, users are sometimes overcome with nostalgia, and like to reminisce about the good old days:

Here’s a reminder that Reddit only exists as it does today because it’s a place where users can teach, learn and hang out with other human beings for free:

While this maybe isn’t the most effective form of protest—with users still generating content, anyone viewing r/steam on the company’s official mobile app will still be served ads, which is the whole reason they’re trying to squeeze third-party applications out in the first place—if you’re going to settle into a protest for the long-run, you may as well have some fun with it.

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Luke Plunkett

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June 21, 2023
Reddit Is Removing Mods Over NSFW Protests

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Image: Reddit

In the wake of sitewide protests, ostensibly over some API changes but really about an increasingly corporate squeeze of a historically community-run site, some Reddit moderators have decided to hit CEO Steve Huffman in the only place it seems to hurt: the site’s wallet.

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Following a disastrous round of press interviews, where Huffman came off sounding more like a Dril tweet than a company CEO and it became clear that mass blackouts were not changing his mind, mods from some of Reddit’s biggest communities decided to switch their subreddits over to NSFW (Not Suitable For Work), a toggle normally reserved for stuff like porn and, crucially, a type of subreddit that Reddit can’t show ads on, and so can’t make money off.

Some of the communities making the switch included r/MildlyInteresting, r/TIHI (Thanks I Hate It) and r/interestingasfuck. It’s a clever move (plus it’s more legal than ransoming the company with stolen data), and one that shows the lengths mods are going to protest Huffman and his team’s actions, but it’s also one that Reddit says violates their “Content Policy and Moderator Code of Conduct”. As a result, and as The Verge report, these mods are now finding themselves “logged out of their account and locked out” by “a Reddit admin account”, and their subreddits—with millions of members—are showing up as being completely unmoderated. Those former mods have also seen their accounts suspended for seven days.

It is incredibly funny to see the lengths Huffman and his staff are going to here. They’re in such a panic about their profit margins—and more importantly in their case, potential future share value--that they’re ignoring the fact Reddit’s entire worth is built on the back of unpaid labour. The site is literally nothing without its users (providing “content”) and mods (working for free), and Huffman is out here worried about ad revenue, from which none of those users see a cent? And sending the message that he’d rather leave whole communities unmoderated than put up with some protests?

The internet has wrought many perils on our civilization, but the one thing it has been good for is helping publicly record just how stupid these CEOs really are.

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Luke Plunkett

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June 20, 2023
Reddit Goes Down As Communities Protest Wildly Unpopular Changes [UPDATE]

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As we reported earlier in the month, Reddit, one of the most popular forums for gaming communities, is planning to make some changes under the hood that will essentially kill off every third-party app. Given the state of the official app and its heavy reliance on huge ads, it’s a deeply unpopular move, so unpopular that it has led to a protest movement that you are likely witnessing the effects of as we speak. If you load Reddit right now, chances are very good that you’re seeing a message that reads, “Sorry, we couldn’t load posts for this page.”

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Alongside big subreddits like r/bestof, r/sports, r/music, r/pics and r/videos, a number of the most popular gaming subreddits have either confirmed they’re taking part, are polling members for their thoughts or will be taking more limited action as well.

That includes r/gaming with its 37 million members, r/PS5 and its 3.3 million members, r/minecraft’s 7 million members and r/wow’s 2.3 million members. Meanwhile mods at r/pcgaming (3.2 million members) are asking users for their input before making a decision, while r/nintendo are going into a “a read-only/restricted mode”, which is not quite as severe as locking the entire subreddit down. But if you’re like most people, you likely just lurk pages, so you may not be able to see anything but this right now:

Screenshot: Reddit / Kotaku

The entire thing has been planned for a while now, as a gathering of Reddit’s unpaid moderators banded together and penned an open letter to the site’s management, outlining not just the general popularity of the third-party apps, but also concerns over the potential loss of important moderation tools (which many third-party apps have but the official offering somehow lacks) and impact on NSFW content as well.

Reddit Goes Down

That letter has been backed by plans for much of the site to engage in a “blackout” on June 12, meaning today, which means individual subreddits will lock down into “private” mode, meaning anyone who isn’t already a follower/subscriber won’t be able to access them or see any of their content.

According to The Verge, over 6,000 subreddits have been affected on Monday as a part of the protest, which will last until the 14th. Some, it should be noted, are planning on staying private until things change. Other communities went dark as soon as the unpopular API changes were announced. Really, there are all sorts of approaches to the bad news. You might notice some communities are indeed available, but you can only post about the API changes. Others meanwhile will let you read the subreddit as it was, but won’t let you make new posts. In short, it’s a shitshow for Reddit.

Update 6/12/2023 11:10 a.m.: We’ve updated this post to reflect that Reddit is now in fact down and out.

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Luke Plunkett

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June 12, 2023