this post was submitted on 24 Apr 2024
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Reddit

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/19946388

An anticapitalist tech blog. Embrace the technology that liberates us. Smash that which does not.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

They could fall out of a 30 story window for all i care

[–] [email protected] 13 points 6 months ago (2 children)

This only affects scrapers. If reddit is selling the data, they will just sell the unedited version from their database.

This is ineffective and deleting or editing reddit comments has always been a circle jerk to make yourself feel good that you are "hurting" reddit in some way.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago (1 children)

While this is true, I also kind of doubt that Reddit isn’t just one mistake away from accidentally deleting an old db and losing the historical data. So it may in fact mess up their ability to sell the data.

Also potential GDPR violations etc if you’re in the EU

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago

If they were that close, they wouldn't run a site which solely relies on the safeguarding of that data. I cannot imagine they don't know how to handle and backup data.

As for the gdpr, selling the data to an AI company for LLMs is probably anonymized. Or they have a database that does not contain any account information and only the posts. From a cursory read of the gdpr your personal data is your account, not necessarily your posts. If the posts are no longer associated with an account they are free game to reddit.

Ironically, deleting the accounts might make it easier for reddit to use the data.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 6 months ago (2 children)

And really just hurts people who are searching for actual human answers to questions later.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (2 children)

There was a time where there were many sites on the internet; hundreds, thousands even. And someone could search for content in topics they were interested in and find discussions in forums. I hope the internet becomes that again and sites like reddit burn to the ground, their servers salted to never grow again.

The world recovered from the burning of Alexandria, and it would recover from the death of reddit. And from the rumbling of their new ad injection schemes, the sooner the better.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

I hope the internet becomes that again and sites like reddit burn to the ground, their servers salted to never grow again.

Based!!!!

[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago

It also hurts reddit. Fewer useful lookups on reddit - fewer visits to reddit.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Making info on Reddit useless to real humans is the main reason I need to set aside time to do this.

I really don’t care if AI trains off of what I’ve said. I do care that greedy greedy Steve Huffman killed 3rd party apps for it.

If Reddit’s use for searching obscure stuff goes away, there goes the biggest draw of the site. Get people going elsewhere. Like here!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago

I don't have anything useful to add other than Steve Huffman is a greedy pig boy.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago (2 children)

I think I have about 4000 comments on reddit. I've stopped using reddit last year in summer when they pushed their fucking API changes; have been on Lemmy since and never looked back. However, I still have the account, because sometimes I had really nice conversations, which I would like to look up once in a while, or to pick up something which I wanted to keep for another time, like a bookmark basically. I'm also one of the people who sometimes write really really much; walls of text as a product of a lot of effort I put in. It would be sad to see it all go away. Then again, fuck reddirt and it's management.

Is there a tool to back up my comments (or also the corresponding threads)? After that I'll gladly use the tool provided by luddite.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

You can request to download your data from reddit, and they'll provide it to you. I did that and made my comments available on github.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I did that and made my comments available on github

How? I've been looking for a way to host my data elsewhere.

I found this website https://www.rareddit.com, but I'm not sure how to do that, and I contacted the author and didn't get a response.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

The destination part is the issue. That github link works very poorly. The rareeddit example is much better.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

The rareddit example is much better.

I'll admit rareddit looks nicer and is more convenient for the user - but it doesn't seem like an option, since (as you said) the author isn't responding.

My data is off reddit (most important part) and findable (bonus).

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago

You can request your data from Reddit and they'll send you a CSV file of all your activity. Takes a couple weeks though.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 6 months ago (3 children)

A few highlights that I'd like to make about this tool and its usage. Note: on a prescriptive level I'm focusing on moral matters, not legal ones.

This tool allows you to edit your content. You might have allowed other people and Reddit Inc. to use it, but it's still yours. And you should be free to do whatever you want with your content, even if it inconveniences others. And people expecting you to give up your moral rights for the sake of their own benefit, frankly, are simply entitled.

Another user here compared this with vandalism; I don't think that the comparison is good, given that vandalism targets someone else's property.

I also think that people in general are focusing too much on the short-term consequences of the usage of this tool, and too little on the long-term. Here comes some bullet points hell:

  • SEO "improvements" already caught up with the "add «reddit» to search queries!" trick. It's becoming less effective over time.
  • Reddit is accumulating huge amounts of noise, due to increased bot activity and decreased moderation. It'll likely get worse over time.
  • Reddit is walling itself off more and more over time. Eventually this info will become unavailable for anyone who ~~didn't sell their soul to Greedy Pigboy~~ isn't feeding that cesspool.
  • Every piece of content that you leave in that site is yet another piece of content "inviting" other users to register and stay there, dumping their content into that increasingly walled garden, where it won't be available publicly. And while they're free to do so if they so desire (it's their content), you're also free to not invite them.
  • There are alternatives to that enshittified platform, competing directly with it. (We're in one, by the way.) We should encourage people to use those alternatives, not Reddit.

Are you all getting the picture? You might be tempted to leave your content in Reddit for the sake of other people; even then, the pros of doing so are rather small, and there are cons not often mentioned.

Regarding LLMs, frankly? I think that it's mostly a neutral point. Sure, data hoarding bots will get your content from Reddit... but they'll do it if you post here in the Fediverse, in your blog, or elsewhere. The only alternative to not feeding those bots is to not speak "in the open".

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I think the most important point is that its competent ineffective for thwarting LLMS. They will be trained using the original data.

Also, if any significant portion of users nuked their comment history it would be trivial for reddit to block the user and undo the edits.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Also, if any significant portion of users nuked their comment history it would be trivial for reddit to block the user and undo the edits.

It would be trivial from a procedure standpoint, but not from a social one. It would be really bad reputation for Reddit - "this site doesn't allow you to remove your content from it". Problematic specially in Europe.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 6 months ago (1 children)

No one cares about their reputation.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

No one cares about their reputation.

This is blatantly false, as advertisers pulling off from Twitter show. Something similar happened in Reddit a few years ago.

They do care about brand reputation. Don't lie (or worse, assume) that they don't.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

Nonsense. What happened with the 3rd party apps thing? Mods were staging strikes, resigning, protesting. Pretty much worst possible case for brand rep.

They just held their ground, users continued, advertisers didn't/ don't care.

Don't labour under the illusion that some kind of people power exists.

For every 1 user that cares about this there are 100s of thousands that just plain don't care.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Has anyone recently checked the Reddit ToS?

It's possible that by clicking that submit button, a perpetual worldwide license was granted that included any purpose Reddit deemed worthy.

That could actually include every single version of every comment. Your first post, your ninja edit to correct your spellings, your edit update, and finally your plugin's update that wipes out your comment. All of this could be data Reddit can provide to LLM researchers.

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