Reddit delivered strong earnings, but the numbers beneath the surface tell a different story. Slowing logged-in user growth and AI-powered search could threaten the platform's long-term value.
Google licensed Reddit’s content to improve AI-generated search summaries. Those summaries frequently answer users’ questions by drawing from Reddit discussions without requiring users to click through to Reddit itself. The arrangement generates licensing revenue, but it may also reduce opportunities to convert casual visitors into engaged, logged-in users who ultimately become more valuable advertising customers.
All reddit ever needed to do was leave it’s users alone and build a functional in house search…
Like, there was a solid decade when I needed to figure something out, I’d search Google and tell it to only provide results from reddit.
If they had licensed a search engine like Google, they’d really have been “the front page of the internet”.
It was that fucking easy, instead they did the opposite and let Google use their data without anyone going to reddit or probably understanding the info came from reddit.
Lol ya I got permabanned for inciting violence for saying I’d be fine with someone doing it in private after some guy was like “the Canadians want us to assassinate him in public. They just won’t say it.” Lol I’ll say it motherfucker!!!
I may seem full of myself but requiring a login drastically reduces educated people existing in reddits ecosystem. I’m completely done with it and have moved back to forums for most things. This shift is the final nail in reddits decade old coffin imo.
If spez would’ve started an askreddit thread about the pros and cons of licensing user content to google he probably would’ve gotten a preview of how much he’d be on the short end of the stick
lol, yeah, that was a predictable outcome.
All reddit ever needed to do was leave it’s users alone and build a functional in house search…
Like, there was a solid decade when I needed to figure something out, I’d search Google and tell it to only provide results from reddit.
If they had licensed a search engine like Google, they’d really have been “the front page of the internet”.
It was that fucking easy, instead they did the opposite and let Google use their data without anyone going to reddit or probably understanding the info came from reddit.
They are also increasingly banning anyone and any sub that is “controvercial.”
Yeah, I was permanently banned a few weeks ago. It’s what brought me back to lemmy.
Lol ya I got permabanned for inciting violence for saying I’d be fine with someone doing it in private after some guy was like “the Canadians want us to assassinate him in public. They just won’t say it.” Lol I’ll say it motherfucker!!!
Now the only difference is you use duckduckgo with reddit appended
You might…
We must cannibalise long term sustainability for short tern quarterly growth! It is the only way.
Spez thought he could make it relevant on its own before the clock ran out on the deal.
I may seem full of myself but requiring a login drastically reduces educated people existing in reddits ecosystem. I’m completely done with it and have moved back to forums for most things. This shift is the final nail in reddits decade old coffin imo.
Short-term profits were great tho! Who cares about the future? Certainly not the asshole called spez
If spez would’ve started an askreddit thread about the pros and cons of licensing user content to google he probably would’ve gotten a preview of how much he’d be on the short end of the stick
Didn’t it happen around IPO?
One could theorise it was done to boost forward projections at that specific time of the company’s lifecycle
Reminds me of that vc fraud article
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/smallbusiness/vc-backed-startups-commit-more-fraud-and-researchers-think-they-know-why/ar-AA299xod
To be fair the other options was Google just using reddit content without there permission, like every other service, and not getting payed at all.
I dunno, we already knew the reddit answer without clicking in and it was “why don’t you google this yourself”.
Those summaries frequently give wrong answers.