Reddit's tech section in chaos over censorship

[maniacalpha1-1]

One thing I hate about reddit is that you know very well that the vast majority of people are going to use the voting system as agree/disagree, yet so many subreddits try to force you not to. Trying to make people use that as quality/not quality instead of agree/disagree is like trying to mop up the ocean. Why even bother?

 

[Murloc]

I kinda agree with their choice of banned words, except for startup.
It isn't about tech anymore if all you talk about is the judiciary situations of bitcoin founder or microsoft or even non-tech and outright political stuff such as assange. It becomes more like dailytech or business insider. It gets boring.

 

[sandorski]

Sometimes I feel like the only guy on the Internet to not go to Reddit. I followed a few links to the place before, but never felt compelled to stay there.

 

[ImpulsE69]

what's reddit

/sarcasm

Never been there, never plan to.

 

[Howard]

Reddit is a flaming piece of shit. I would start frequenting pinterest before reddit.

AMAs excepted, but only because of the sometimes hilarious content.

 

[bluearyus]

the best subreddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/atot/

 

[KlokWyze]

Come on guys, Reddit isn't THAT bad. I prefer standard message board format, but Reddit definitely has an interesting take on things that does really create a collaborative and functional, problem solving tool.

I do agree though... the AMA's are such a pain in the ass to read. I go there occasionally, but never stay very long. Earthporn is awesome though!

 

[HamburgerBoy]

• Being shadow-banned (not knowing you're banned, you can still post/etc but nobody can see it.. so you never know you're banned)

This is brilliant.

 

[chimaxi83]

We have a local subreddit that is unusable by myself and my friends simply because the moderators have personal problems (real life argument) with us and have banned us. The fact that there is no real way to combat this (besides starting my own subreddit for the 3 of us) is enough for me to just dismiss reddit as anything worthwhile.

Weird. Reddit just being Reddit is enough for me to dismiss Reddit as anything worthwhile.

 

[Gooberlx2]

Why would a tech blog/site ban the use of words that are highly relevant to the tech world.

They're not a blog or tech site in the same fashion as anandtech. They're a forum-of-sorts, with the intention being links to articles and comments. I can absolutely see the reasoning behind banning oft-posted overly politicized circle-jerking tech topics, and leaving them for the politics subs, and trying to keep to other tech news...but having no discussion with the subscribers and doing it the way they did is pretty effing lazy.

 

[IAteYourMother]

The internet is serious business.

 

[AznAnarchy99]

People at reddit take themselves way to seriously. Almost like our video card forum.

 

[HOSED]

Why do geeks work for free? Moderating a forum etc.. seems like working for free. The site owner makes all the profits, you get all the work. I never understood why people do this for free.

After spending a few misguided years over at NBR I would say it is more of a power trip for the moderators. Over there one had to get permission just to discuss hot button issues (such as School shooting) and any mention of certain mid eastern nations closely allied to the US generated a warning. Posts were often edited and users were banned early and often. (just the opposite of what goes on in the forum)

I am so glad I joined here where I can be myself
plus I am interested in the the free Ipod

 

[z1ggy]

I pretty much only use reddit for worldnews, news, TIL, AMA and pr0n.

 

[Brian Stirling]

I kinda agree with their choice of banned words, except for startup.
It isn't about tech anymore if all you talk about is the judiciary situations of bitcoin founder or microsoft or even non-tech and outright political stuff such as assange. It becomes more like dailytech or business insider. It gets boring.

Please, it IS highly relevant for a tech site to be talking about things that effect the tech world. The exposure of information provided by Snowden has been a very important topic that actually goes beyond the world of governments spying and as Heartbleed has shown exposes us to huge potential loses -- I think that's something we should be talking about.

And when I look at this site, for example, that does not, as best I can tell, try to stop discussion of such topics it hasn't brought the system down or even been more than the occasional topic for discussion. Me thinks the idea that these topics will take over is unfounded.

But again, lets see the whole list of banned words and when they became banned as I think the timeline will be most revealing...


Brian

 

[Brian Stirling]

They're not a blog or tech site in the same fashion as anandtech. They're a forum-of-sorts, with the intention being links to articles and comments. I can absolutely see the reasoning behind banning oft-posted overly politicized circle-jerking tech topics, and leaving them for the politics subs, and trying to keep to other tech news...but having no discussion with the subscribers and doing it the way they did is pretty effing lazy.

Yeah, maybe, but the list of banned words seems pretty focussed to me and there's a crap ton of other topics that will generate a lot of heat from the readers. And, as i've said elsewhere, the particular topics are not nearly the scorchingly hot topics anyway -- sure, they get some folks in a lather but hardly in the same league as school shootings or the actions of Israelis/Palestinians, etc...


Brian

 

[JTsyo]

I like the /r/AskScience subreddit. Just go each week and look at the top questions for the week. You can learn some interesting stuff. Same for any games you're interested in, though there are plenty of other forums for games.

 

[sourceninja]

Weird. Reddit just being Reddit is enough for me to dismiss Reddit as anything worthwhile.

Yea, it was pretty funny. Guy posts about a band playing at a bar in town. My friend posts to ask if that was the same band that played at X other bar a week ago, and banned. We all followed suit in short time.

 

[surfsatwerk]

Srsly wtf is up with the comments layout? It's like they don't want anyone to read it.

 

[lupi]

Really, what does snowden, assange, or anon have to do with tech. And bitcoin and some of the others probably got lumped I because the discussion of those topics had little to do with the tech.

 

[B-Riz]

Good riddance.

I am "meh" towards reddit.

IMHO, the Slashdot system seems to work pretty well for commenting and moderating on user submitted and vote based news stories.

 

[smackababy]

Really, what does snowden, assange, or anon have to do with tech. And bitcoin and some of the others probably got lumped I because the discussion of those topics had little to do with the tech.

Snowden and the NSA has a lot to do with technology and the ramifications of a digital world. Assange, maybe not so much. Anon being cyber terrorists and taking down some of the larger internet communities is definitely tech related.

I don't visit reddit mostly due to the people who do being complete twats and fedora wearing fucktards, the format being the worst possible thing someone could imagine, and the content being bad.

 

[halik]

Lol, is there anyone on the planet that thinks Reddit is the front page?
The funny section maybe.

Lol reddit in general

 

[Brian Stirling]

Really, what does snowden, assange, or anon have to do with tech. And bitcoin and some of the others probably got lumped I because the discussion of those topics had little to do with the tech.

Not sure if serious...

OK, let's see...

The fact that various entities are leaving vulnerabilities into the internet and it's many areas and the FACT that the tech world is dependant on the internet would be a big reason.

How about the fact that some of these vulnerabilities expose all of us, including tech workers and companies, to theft of identity as well as economic theft not to mention theft of IP -- surely you don't think that's irrelevant to the tech world, do you?

But, perhaps you could be more specific in detailing why we in the tech world should pay no attention to these topics...


Brian

 

[Anubis]

Srsly wtf is up with the comments layout? It's like they don't want anyone to read it.

this is why i never got into reddit. it reminds me of a geocities page from 1998