A Reddit thread on how Reddit is killing forums.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/s/hp0aOnbyFy
 

yet this place persists. I've been here 23 years. And I'll keep coming back. 

Want nothing to do with Reddit. Love this place!

Well from what I've seen there are only about 3 whole brain cells on the whole of Reddit. The place is, at best, a hivemind of morons. So let them take all the people who shouldn't be on forums, keep the signal to noise down for those of us still smart enough to know why forums exist 

Reddit isn't the worst thing in the world (a couple subs I am on are extremely valuable to me) but it definitely has the problem of everything going to E36 M3 as a sub grows past a certain size. I'm also expecting everything about it to go downhill now that they've IPOed and have to return value to shareholders.

All that said I have also been here 20+ years and will remain indefinitely.

Deleted my 11 year old Reddit account recently. Still occasionally visit but don't interact. The basic format encourages cheap, reference based humor and discourages any conversation lasting more than a few messages. Everything has also gotten worse since their IPO, a common theme 

The pontiac solstice forums are still worse.

Reddit has banned me from two groups/threads/whatever they are called because they don't want discussion that doesn't fit their woke narrative. Their mods have a definite god complex.

Reddit is for the most part a shell of it's former self. I barely use it anymore.

Group discussion on the web has been an interesting environment.  From the boards of the 90s to X now and who knows what tomorrow.  GRM has been a great environment since it began but that is more due to the members mostly being respectful and having a sense of humor.  And thanks to the admins for keeping their admin to a minimum and stepping in only when things got out of hand.  

i've found Reddit very valuable for discussion and humor of really niche interests/hobbies - and i've learned some pretty good stuff in those areas that helped me out.

but generally speaking, beyond that as a place of general discussion and opinions, one of the best takes i ever heard was "assume everyone you talk to on Reddit is 15, and it'll make a lot more sense."

its suffering the same fate as Digg did too (ironically, the site that migrated a ton of users to Reddit)...its become the same fanboy lynchmob except now with the addition of a heavy infestation of bots and low effort karma farming.  a lot of really good, well articulated discussion points tend to get buried because they're unpopular while dumb but pandering takes get boosted to the top.  the signal to noise ratio requires that you really, really carefully cultivate the subreddits you follow.  its the same course of action with twitter and instagram.  zoom way in on the stuff you have a major interest in and trim/unfollow the junk with great prejudice, otherwise you'll be overrun by stupidity and rage-bait.

forums like this are great because the format feels like a real discussion and everything's more personal.  i love being able to follow the projects too.  i grew up in the heyday of forums and i'll never forgive that android meatbag zuckerburg for hastening their demise with stupid facebook groups.

There is value in Reddit. For example. Th is thread on a $300 eBay tri flip tonneau cover for f150's. https://www.reddit.com/r/F150Lightning/s/WUM8GpQ4pX
 

I mean a bakflip Is $1500.  Why?

Now, I like forums but I'm old.  I find Facebook groups be even more transactional with less depth than reddit. Thats gotta be where discord slots? Maybe?

In reply to Fueled by Caffeine :

I am slightly older than you and agree that there is value in Reddit if you know how to use it. Every sub Reddit is different and caters to a different demographic. 

I never had or used Facebook so I cant comment, but I did try to get into Discord in order to see what my middle child was doing ... that was a frustrating effort and it made me understand my dad when he calls me for help doing basic stuff on his phone/computer. I could never figure out how to use it. 

Years ago after hearing about how great reddit was, i checked it out. I figured i was doing something wrong as it appeared to just be crappy old format bulletin board. I asked a tech friend of mine who is my age and the answer was no, it really is just a crappy old format bulletin board. "Meh". 

I tend to think that Facebook Groups killed forums, not Reddit.

I never got into Reddit, but lately I see a lot of their posts as results when I Google something so I use it as a guest.  I did bookmark a sub for denture wearers recently, seemed like it has some decent advice and haven't noticed any trolls yet.

(And +1 for FB groups having more to do with it.  Easily.)

If there were boobie pictures on the GRM forum, would be no reason for reddit to even exist IMO.

In reply to Olemiss540 :

In reply to Olemiss540 :

I wish you guys had said something sooner, if this is all it takes.

edit: Damn, y'all are FAST.

Margie

Thank you, everyone, for the long-term support in keeping this a healthy, vibrant community. 

TJL (Forum Supporter) said:

Years ago after hearing about how great reddit was, i checked it out. I figured i was doing something wrong as it appeared to just be crappy old format bulletin board. I asked a tech friend of mine who is my age and the answer was no, it really is just a crappy old format bulletin board. "Meh". 

That is why I never got the appeal of it, though I've started to use it more to due to the classifieds groups. The layout felt like I was looking at old Audiworld, and the current Quattroworld style forum...

I'm also in the camp of Facebook killed forums, not Reddit. It's a damn shame too, some of the old dedicated platform forums contained a wealth of technical knowledge about said platforms. Trying to search for a known issue on a particular platform in one of the Facebook groups is like pulling teeth, more akin to asking your dog for stock market advice. Whatever their search engine algorithm is for, it certainly isn't set up for the sharing of archived knowledge. Like most social media, it appears to be geared towards the latest hotness that will spark controversy-based gossiping, with anything insightful taking a back seat. 

I've been a part of numerous forums over the past few decades, a few subs on Reddit and quite a few car-based FB groups (almost a necessity these days)... GRM is the best car-based forum on the Internet. The level of knowledge, respect and wit found here is unmatched by any board I've ever observed. Kudos to the folks that keep this board running! 

I find Reddit's top posts list useful to see what the current group think is (it's design has huge tyranny of the majority issues).  As noted, heavily populated by (seemingly) teens.

It's also a great place to exercise your critical thinking skills and spot influence campaigns, both internal and external of the US  I picked up a rather obvious (to me at least!) one from Russia.... right before the invasion....

There are certainly useful sub groups, but the top thread is almost the very definition of what is wrong with the modern state of the internet.

I cannot say exactly why this place is so much better, but I suspect some of it (no insult intended) has to do with a tendency to attract somewhat older (tend to be more rational, less emotional.... tend to be...) and self-motivated people.  The average GRM reader also, seems to be, a bit smarter than the average bear....

I'm not on social media, so I definitely know that I'm missing out on content and marketplace that has largely moved to that platform.   The death of Photobucket also killed a lot of great legacy content on forums. 

I browse Reddit every day - it's a cesspool, but it's huge and there are some entertaining subreddits, like JustRolledIntoTheShop.  I definitely don't contribute or post to Reddit, as there is a very narrow narrative and political swimlane that is allowed.  

GRM Forum is the last one I visit, and I visit nearly every day.  It's a haven for successful and resourceful folks that share a common interest.  I miss the glory days of forums and appreciate that this one is thriving.

Reddit may have killed forums, but Reddit is surely killing itself.

I spent a lot of years on Reddit; several of those years were as a moderator, including for such subs as r/cars and r/trucks. As the subs grew they became worse and worse: We had to adopt more and more rules to keep discussions topical (in r/cars in particular) and with at least some semblance of quality. 

gixxeropa is right in that the format of Reddit often encourages short, low-quality, referenced-based "humor." This is tedious. I made an effort to only or mostly only comment when I had reasonable input: Something that could be fleshed out, something that was useful, etc. Unfortunately this was not the norm.

ddavidv - you were probably banned for breaking the rules. It's a common narrative that mods are "woke" or "power hungry" or whatever, but the reality is that most just want to create a neat community and a fun, topical space. If you were banned from multiple communities with different moderators, I'd suggest that you look at what there was in common with those interactions.

All that said, I left Reddit a year ago. After putting in many hundreds if not some thousands of hours as a volunteer on the site -- I even set up an AMA with the GRM staff at one point -- Reddit just kind of ate itself for me when Steve Huffman decided to kill third-party app support (which existed before Reddit's own app and helped create Reddit) and then denigrate the moderators who volunteered their time to build the site that made him millions of dollars. That sort of arroganice, dismissiveness, and scorn turned me off from not only volunteering but also contributing to such a site. It was then that I transitioned my car stuff over to the GRM forums. 

I still miss several aspects of Reddit, sure, but not enough to go back. Now I'm participating in a forum thread regarding a Reddit thread on how Reddit is killing forums and contributing to a forum killing Reddit. 

In reply to buzzboy :

oh 100%