• Voyager@psychedelia.ink
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    1 year ago

    Is reddit owned and operated by a malicious entity? I used to be addicted to that platform, but now I can’t stand it.

    • UlyssesT [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      1 year ago

      Is reddit owned by a malicious entity?

      Always has been.

      astronaut-2 astronaut-1

      As with many things under capitalism, the ongoing mandate is that profits must go up, and must go up at a higher rate no matter what, or investors panic and the price drops steeply which can lead to a collapse. Reddit is just another ravenous profit-seeking vehicle of the same kind and is going into the same “line must go up” death spiral.

      • Amputret@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        1 year ago

        I wouldn’t say Reddit always has been owned by a malicious entity, Aaron Swartz was a cool guy. And if you’re telling me a man who freely distributed thousands of needlessly paywalled research papers is a some kind of arch capitalist, then there’s no helping you.

        • fox [comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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          1 year ago

          Swartz had good beliefs about freedom of information but politically was kind of a weirdo. What happened to him is an unlimited tragedy and outright criminal.

        • antonim@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          1 year ago

          Swartz co-owned reddit for around 1 year, 2006-2007. His influence has overall probably been insignificant.

          • Amputret@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            1 year ago

            True true, I just specifically took issue with it always having been run by bastards. (I know it’s a meme template, but I just wanted to point to evidence that there is hope that not everything we use has always been yoked with pure greed. Call it a cope, IDC.)

            • UlyssesT [he/him]@hexbear.net
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              1 year ago

              there is hope that not everything we use has always been yoked with pure greed

              If your basis for believing that is Reddit having one co-owner you liked for one year and that’s the best evidence you got, that isn’t a strong basis.

              You can do sophistic tricks like exaggerating other people’s positions to try to make yours seem more tenable so you can mine for supposed exceptions, but the reality remains that capitalism requires increasingly unsustainable profit margins over time for the lifetime of each product and that consequently results in systemic enshittification of things that were previously decent and bearable. That is an inevitable ongoing process in this present system.

        • UlyssesT [he/him]@hexbear.net
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          1 year ago

          then there’s no helping you

          That smuglord tone isn’t necessary.

          One co-owner being around for one year doesn’t absolve the skullduggery of the other that is still here to the present day, as another poster already mentioned.

        • kingthrillgore@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          Honestly as a capitalist (I know, blasphemy) Aaron did the world a favor when he dropped those papers. Elsevier Wiley IEEE et al have a cartel and so many of them are NIH or DOD funded papers they should be public domain period.

          The premise of our system depends on controls to avoid instilled entries extorting capital. Capitalism isn’t: it’s feudalism with extra steps

          • UlyssesT [he/him]@hexbear.net
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            1 year ago

            Honestly as a capitalist (I know, blasphemy)

            Before you congratulate yourself again for internet bravery, do you actually own capital? Do you own the means of production? If not, you’re not a capitalist even if you wave pompoms and otherwise do apologia for capitalism.

    • saigot@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      they are preparing for IPO, the most inherently malicious owner there is!

        • saigot@lemmy.ca
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          1 year ago

          yeah they aren’t IPO yet, I think a lot of stuff didn’t play nicely for them, with the ukraine war, the tech bubbles popping and the general global economic conditions things aren’t exactly favourable. I think also the backlash to 3rd party apps and their general shittiness has been hurting them a bit more than they have said.

        • kingthrillgore@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          Have been for years. Reddit is mismanaged, and the IPO is just an effort to get whatever they can before letting suckers hold the bag. They will never reach the valuation they had.

    • amio@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      Certainly by a greedy one. Greed and stupidity are often better explanations than outright malice, but… yeah, they’re a bunch of assholes, too.

      • Kill_John_Lennon@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I mean, I’m not denying they’re making wrong choices, and I’ve left Reddit myself, but given that they’re losing money I don’t understand how it’s considered ”greedy” to try and change that.

    • Bluefold@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      The largest owners are Advance Publications and Tencent. Advance also own Condé Nasty (Reddit even used to be under the Condé Nast banner). Weirdly they also own everyone’s favorite plagiarism detection service Turnitin.

      • ilikecoffee@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I know of Tencent and the controversy about them… I don’t know anything about Advance though. Are they also controversial?

      • DoucheBagMcSwag@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        1 year ago

        If you look at who Spez idolizes (Musk) and how he treated and talked about the protesters…. No. He or the board doesn’t get a pass for this. This is a move stemmed 100% from financial gain and malfeasance

        • Clent@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          The actual razor in that case; incompetent malice.

          They think their platform is unique - incompetence.

          They think this users are morons to be milked - malice.

          Eventually the second part becomes true as the intelligent users realize the first is not l, leaving only morons who are easily milked.