cross-posted from: feddit.org/post/37870004

reddit got bad because spez (the reddit admin) restricted API access to the platform for third-party apps, such that people would be forced to use the official app or web UI, both of which display advertisement and collect user data (e.g. scroll behavior).

the reason why this happened is because reddit is a for-profit company and tries to extract money out of the userbase, at the expense of the users.

another example of a bad decision that reddit made was to push a lot of ragebait (“Am I The Asshole?”) because company shareholders want to see “engagement numbers” go up, and if somebody writes an angry reply to a post, that’s “engagement”. but it makes you angry at the stupidity of the “Asshole”, so it makes your day worse. that is another example how reddit makes money at the expense of the users.

size (number of monthly active users) is not what made reddit bad. commercialization is.

we should probably get rid of the “don’t make lemmy grow, it will ruin the platform if we grow” idea.

The State Dept is running ads warning Americans from going to dangerous places where they may be wrongfully detained, kidnapped, or killed.

Such places, they say, are L4 travel advisory places.

Did they put themselves on the same list?

Around the world, technology is increasingly being used to stifle dissent, assert control and diminish human rights.

Our new Global Report on the Authoritarian Use of Technology documents how states are deploying surveillance technologies to monitor people, target communities and entrench systems of control.

https://privacyinternational.org/report/5873/global-report-authoritarian-use-technology/

@mpjgregoire
Agreed. Whenever it comes to ‘austerity’ and ‘tightening out belts’ inevitably it’s the underprivileged and vulnerable that are asked to make sacrifices, yet the massive amounts of public money flowing to companies that don’t even really need it are conveniently overlooked.

Buying a large-format hardback edition of The Lorax and taking it to the Labour conference to hit every one of those fuckers squarely upside the head with it

Everyone knows exactly who Mark Zuckerberg is but they keep using his products, ensuring the wealth that makes him dangerous.

#Facebook #Instagram #Meta #Muse #Whatsapp

So not unlike the groupthink you encounter on the Fediverse? Where it’s even more perverse due to defederation and due to the networks being much smaller

@Vivaldi just discovering this now! Great new addition!

"Wenn einer Lehrkraft das Tragen eines Sea-Watch-Shirts verboten wird, tragen wir es eben alle"

Unter dem Motto „Wochen der Seenotrettung“ starten die GEW Bremen, die GEW Hessen und die Organisation Sea-Watch eine gemeinsame Kampagne. Diese soll Aufmerksamkeit für die zivile Seenotrettung im Mittelmeer schaffen. Zugleich machen die Organisationen deutlich, dass demokratisches Engagement von Beschäftigten im Bildungsbereich nicht eingeschüchtert oder unterbunden werden darf.

Man lässt keine Menschen ertrinken Punkt!

Solidarisch. Nicht neutral!

https://sea-watch.org/gew-bremen-gew-hessen-und-sea-watch-starten-gemeinsame-kampagne/

#SeenotrettungIstPflicht

#SeaWatch #Repression #Seenotrettung #Asyl #Migration

We cannot adapt to an unlivable planet.

It’s time to demand justice 👉 https://act.gp/3RLI2EV

Witness the Septopert, which is not just the smallest known Nopert at 7 vertices, but we now know it is the smallest possible Nopert!

New Noperts drop: https://github.com/tom7/noperts

The fact that it contains a Triforce and the eponymous 7 is not a cheeky easter-egg, but simply a BEAUTIFUL PROPERTY OF MATHEMATICS.

I want writers to be paid, just like I want to be paid. But here’s the deal. If I wanted to pay to follow your Substack or Patreon, I would. But posting links to those sites on social media doesn’t really make sense. It’s a tease into a paywall. The problem is, if I’m not a subscriber, I don’t have any reason to follow your social media account. There really has to be a better way.

#Writing #Publishing

yes, assuming you are there for a discussion and not entertainment.

most folks are on reddit for entertainment, let’s not kid ourselves. very tiny sliver of the users were there for discussion.

For me reddit got bad because of grouphink and terrible moderation (you were not nice to some idiot? banned for life!). I never used any 3rd party apps (nor the official app for that matter, only the website with adblock).

one sub i recently visited talking jobs/layoffs got meme-fied recently. because happen tor each the front page a couple times, it drawn into many trolls and bots.

biblically accurate angels blew up cuz they made neet husks in youtube comments sections glimpse the marvelous for the 1st time since they were 7, then the internet spent the last decade working tirelessly, out of love, to petrify and print millions of their now-predictable listless forms out for twee window dressing as if they're any other coming and going meme, unable to see any other way to love anything in the 21st century.