

Reddit was amazing - vkb
http://blog.vickiboykis.com/2015/06/reddit-was-amazing/

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RichardZBrookes
Good observations. Questions to ask about them:

Can you be successful without acquiring some form of power, and can you
receive that power and not work to retain it? In other words, how inevitable
is the process that affected the extreme socialism of the early USSR and the
extreme libertarianism of the early internet?

If this was triggered by the recent incidents at reddit, are they really
relating to commercial / advertising pressure, or are they an attempt to _use_
the power that the controllers of reddit have gained, towards what they see as
worthwhile ends?

~~~
vkb
I really think a lot of this is driven by $$$, although some part of it
probably is, yes, the CEO trying to gain control of Reddit, although judging
by Yishan Wong's exit, that hasn't been possible for this site previously. As
someone mentioned in another HN comment about the issue (I forget which
thread), advertisers are scared of content they can't control, content that is
in the hands of users who could go off-message at any moment. That's why
small, "indie" sites never make money and why the most popular sites, such as
Buzzfeed, as I mentioned, are so bland and universal as to offend as little of
their demographic as possible.

As to the first part of your question, I'm hoping some people more qualified
in historical analysis than me can jump in :)

