
Jedberg leaves reddit - kacy
http://www.reddit.com/tb/i29yk
======
blhack
IMHO, this is a major, major loss for reddit. Jedberg, I know you read HN --
you were a _hugely_ important part of that community; any time there was about
to be a user revolt, it seemed like a red-lettered Jedberg would pop up in the
thread to calm everybody down.

I don't think you were technically a community manager (were you?) but you did
a damn good job at it anyway.

~~~
jedberg
Thank you. That really means a lot to me.

~~~
blhack
Good, man. You deserve every word of praise that you get, especially for
keeping that site running with the team you had (5, was it? And you were the
only SA?).

Good luck at whatever it is that you decide to do :)

~~~
jedberg
Thank you. That's very kind of you.

The most dire time was right after raldi left, when I had just two tech
people, a programmer and a sysadmin.

------
kacy
He was employee number one and I think the last remaining link to the founding
team (not sure). I've got a lot of respect for him, especially after meeting
him in person when I toured the office earlier this year. His commute was over
2 hours each day, and he had to deal with all the scaling issues with amazon
almost single-handedly, not to mention the Saturday nights that were devoted
to keeping the site up.

I wish you the best, dude. Hopefully you'll join hipmunk! :-)

~~~
jedberg
First I have to clarify that nothing I did was single handed. I couldn't
possibly have done what I did without the support of the awesomeness that was
the rest of team reddit.

As for hipmunk, I think they already have too much talent, since they have the
rest of reddit. :)

~~~
holdenk
You should come swing by the foursquare offices sometime if your bored, I'll
get you a fresh pack of bacon if you give me a heads up :)

~~~
jedberg
Everything up to the bacon sounded good. :) I think you sent me an email, I'll
hit you up there.

------
eggbrain
The biggest question I have is: why are so many people leaving Reddit?

Over the past few months, the site has grown continuously yet the people that
have been the driving force of the site seem to be leaving just as the site is
hitting its peak. What has changed?

~~~
runinit
I think Jedberg is leaving because he values his marriage over reddit. He
kinda hints at that in his blog post.

~~~
dailo10
He has one of the most difficult, stressful jobs scaling one of the most
heavily trafficked sites in the world.

And I'm sure the bitching and moaning whenever there's downtime doesn't help.

~~~
astrodust
Under-funded, over-loaded, filled with hyper-critical users and entire armies
of abusers. Sounds like a great job!

Anyone who's stuck that out for years is a hero.

~~~
jedberg
Someone sent me a cape once, but it didn't fit.

To be honest, none of those things by themselves really bothered me. But I
supposed the sum total of it always dragged on my subconscience.

~~~
panacea
>Someone sent me a cape once, but it didn't fit.

How does a cape not fit??

~~~
jedberg
The thing that goes around the neck was too small. :) It was a kids cape.

~~~
panacea
Cheers jedberg. For the fish and all that.

------
starnix17
What are the odds he ends up at Hipmunk?

It's not mentioned at all in the post, but it seems like a lot of ex-reddit
employees end up there.

~~~
rottencupcakes
He confirms he isn't in the thread:

> Not leaving to work at Hipmunk? Breaking tradition eh?

> Jedberg: Nah, they're full up on awesomeness already.

[http://www.reddit.com/r/blog/comments/i29yk/all_good_things/...](http://www.reddit.com/r/blog/comments/i29yk/all_good_things/c20anqk)

------
antirez
There is something sounding very wrong about that: the work of a sysadmin that
is of value for a big site should never reach the point to be so stressful
that you have to wake up on alerts too many times.

It may happen 4 or 5 days every year maybe, if it is worse than that then
there is something wrong. It is not impossible that jedberg is actually
leaving because that kind of condition is not good in the long time. But here
the problem is, a better employer would fix the root cause instead of letting
good people go.

I'm saying that as I think this happens in many places actually, and is a huge
mistake. A lot of work and traffic should never turn into a nightmare for a
few guys.

~~~
Joakal
That's a good point, why can't responses be automated to alerts? I wonder what
critical parts he needs to fix.

~~~
redthrowaway
They did automate most of it. They need to get off EBS, as there are simply
too many issues with it that have a negative effect on performance and
stability. Doing that, however, is a bit of a task.

------
ivanbernat
A guy with so much knowledge about running such a huge site probably has
hundreds of job offers. Best of luck Jedberg, wish you all the best!

~~~
jcol
Reddit has quite a few stability/uptime problems. Probably not his fault, but
a scary prospect nonetheless.

EDIT: Did I get downvoted by someone who thinks Reddit is stable? It clearly
isn't and anyone who thinks otherwise is dreaming. I guess I'll stop going
against the HN hivemind just to keep my account in good standing. This place
feels more like Reddit every day.

~~~
younata
> This place feels more like Reddit every day.

That's why I downmodded you.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Didn't you prove him right ...?

------
Hovertruck
Wow, I just watched him give a presentation on reddit architecture at Velocity
yesterday. Shame to see him go.

~~~
jedberg
And let me tell you how awkward that was knowing that I was going to post this
today! And not being able to say anything.

~~~
malnourish
Were you able to make arrangements with the team to make the transition
easier? Do they know the ropes as well as you?

Was there much camaraderie among the team members? It seemed that way.

Did you have to agree to/sign anything from Conde Nast to proceed with your
resignation?

I wish you the best of luck and I hope you succeed both personally and in
future ventures.

~~~
jedberg
We all got along very well and I'm confident that they will be able to handle
it. Also, I'm not dropping off the face of the planet -- they can still ask me
questions. :)

------
staunch
From someone that spent years sysadmining very high traffic systems: Well done
sir. Well done.

Been using Reddit since launch. Somewhat nervous that the new people running
Reddit will get overrun by the corporate overlords now that they see the
"hockey stick" traffic charts.

I can see some bean counter doing the math:

    
    
      Slap 4 teeth whitening ads on every page
      = 4 ad impressions
      * 1.2 billion page views
      = 4.8 billion ad impressions
      * $0.30 - $0.50 eCPM
      = $17 - $28 million/year.

~~~
blhack
I've said it before, so I apologize for repeating myself, but it shocks me
(shocks!) that reddit doesn't append affiliate IDs to all of the outbound
links to amazon that are generated.

I've probably made well over $100 in purchases just in the last few months via
links I've seen on reddit. ("Can you recommend a good book on
welding/bicycles/iOS dev/etc.")

Hopefully they don't do what you're suggesting, because I think if they did,
the users would leave almost immediately (and probably flood HN).

~~~
rick888
One of the problems with Reddit is that the vast majority of users are anti-
ads and anti-corporation making any form of commercialism (even if it means
more employees or a better site) nearly impossible.

~~~
redthrowaway
And yet tons of them shell out $4 a month for Gold, so it's clearly not
impossible to monetize.

~~~
rick888
I still don't think it's enough though.

------
wccrawford
While I'm not nearly so famous as he is, and the job wasn't either, I know how
he feels... I had the same routine as him. Check things all day from the time
you wake until you go to sleep, and when you do sleep, fear that you'll be
woken up by a problem.

And I know what a relief it was when it was gone. It really does feel like a
weight has been lifted from your shoulders.

------
fragsworth
4 years, I wonder if his shares just fully vested and he's been waiting for
it.

~~~
brown9-2
I might be mistaken but Conde Nast is a privately owned company.

~~~
dstein
You can still have a vesting period for shares in a private company. 4 years
is a normal amount of time to be fully vested.

~~~
tptacek
Private company shares are usually illiquid, or have their liquidity
controlled by the company.

------
fourply
i actually got a little teary-eyed about this. i know i'll "see him around" as
much as anyone can in communities like these but it really is sad.

------
ohashi
What would you like to do now Jedberg?

------
sidcool
Jedber will be missed.

