1y ago

Reddit locks down its public data in new content policy, says use now requires a contract

Reddit locks down its public data in new content policy, says use now requires a contract | TechCrunch

The newly announced "Public Content Policy" will now join Reddit's existing privacy policy and content policy to guide how Reddit's data is being accessed and used by commercial entities and other partners.

78 comments

Oh so now the data is being sold instead of given away freely lmao
- See my other comments in this thread. Mangle your previous Reddit comments however you see fit, and let them sell your mangled garbage...
  
  Run it through an AI to accelerate model collapse. In fact make more comments, but run all through an AI first.
  
  I used a tool to mangle my comments last June, manually verifying that every single comment in my decade+ account history was changed.
  About a month ago I looked at my profile, and several comments — including ones on the first page of my profile (that I definitely know would have been edited, that close to the top) — were reverted to their unedited state.
  I wonder if an edit then delete would do it - multiple steps.
- in their defense, it was probably also being sold before.
I’m sad how far Reddit has fallen from its peak.
At the same time, I’m quite glad I left it a year ago.
- I tried to go back, but it feels hollow. Plus, the shit ton of ads didn't help.
  
  There is a handful of smaller communities that still exists that are still good. But most of them are gone or filled with content farming spam.
  
  Oh, absolutely. It’s completely lost its appeal for me. Moreso because a ton of the more technical subs I used to frequent were populated by power users, and a significant fraction of those users have very aggressively and thoroughly scrubbed their accounts. We’re mostly all on Lemmy now :)
  
  Sync for Lemmy now spams your screen with ads unless you fork over cash for the premium version. I immediately switched to connect app
  
  they drove away the back bone of content and replaced with shiti bots to try to drive engagement. it is not that obvious at first but a while a you just feel that it is dead.
  SEO killed google search, whatever this shit is deff killed reddit.
  volumes of content being generate tho...
- Your upvotes are at 69 so I just want to say nice post.
Remember when reddit used to have great AMAs to look forward to? Or when askreddit wasn't all sex questions from 13 year old kids? Or when wtf was actually wtf content? Ah the good old days.
- The last two weren't ever true
  
  In the old days WTF was fucked up shit haha
- Or when r/all wasn't filled with Reddit soap-opera content in AITAH, TIFU, relationshipadvice, etc which are clearly fanfic and everyone pretends like they are real.
  I just saved two homeless kids from being run over by a firetruck am I the asshole?
  
  which are clearly fanfic and everyone pretends like they are real.
  "Oh WhO cArEs?! ThEy aRe sTilL eNtErTaInInG! "- thirteen year olds
  
  And BORU was actually interesting stories instead of... Compilations of other redditors' creative writing.
- Or when it wasn't run by Zionists and people with political agendas?
  
  That never existed.
Unfortunately, we see more and more commercial entities using unauthorized access or misusing authorized access to collect public data in bulk, including Reddit public content, worse, these entities perceive they have no limitation on their usage of that data, and they do so with no regard for user rights or privacy, ignoring reasonable legal, safety, and user removal requests. While we will continue our efforts to block known bad actors, we need to do more to restrict access to Reddit public content at scale to trusted actors who have agreed to abide by our policies. But we also need to continue to ensure that users, mods, researchers, and other good-faith, non-commercial actors have access.”
So, pay to get access, like Google did with their $60 million deal. We're nothing but money to them.
- We’re nothing but money to them.
  Welcome to capitalism?
  Always has been.
- My favourite one is when a company says it’s “investing in the local economy” by setting up somewhere, but odds are these jobs are gonna be minimum wage. No, you making money off people, you aren’t there to invest in anything.
- They do so with no regard for user rights or privacy
  Yeah but throw them a buck and all those rights and privacy go away
You fellow Lemmings / banned Redditors wanna try to have some fun? Let me know if you can view my edited comment, edited well after my ban...
https://www.reddit.com/r/whatcarshouldIbuy/comments/wj03s4/2012_mazda_5_salvage_title_8k_good_deal_50k_miles/ijemmwu
Please let me know if you folks can or can't read my post-ban edited comment. I'm experimenting on how much I can do with my old banned Reddit account.
- Does this help?
  
  Yes! This confirms others can access and view my edit!
- We don't know how deletions work on the back end of Reddit. It might just be marked deleted but exist on the servers. And I assume that's the case. Especially for things >24 hours
  
  Still, I just edited my comment from like 2 years ago, under my banned account, under a deleted post...
  I got 7 years worth of Reddit comments I can edit! I could make my own custom fragmented Base64 filesystem with my old comments LOL!
  
  They store the current edit and one previous version back, and deletion does not count as an edit as it only hides the latest version from showing on the front end and through the api.
  This was found out by people trying to edit and delete comments in mass during the api exodus.
  So you'd want to edit the comment to garbage twice before deleting it, and hope they aren't willing to restore shit from deeper backups they surely have for system safety (speaking as a systems engineer) that they haven't pulled from yet.
  
  And actually, it is known how Reddit flags deleted stuff. They flag it with 999.
  We can thank Camas for that...
  https://search.pullpush.io/
- I can see the comment
- I can see it via the webapp
  
  Cool beans!
  I just stress tested the idea with the entire Bee Movie script, Reddit said it has to be less than 10,000 characters..
  So now we know the limits!
- I searched my name and found a few times my name was mentioned in replies. I looked at the parent comment which were mine and though my names is Deleted, my comments were back not edited and deleted. I assume that they have undone all the changes I made.
  
  Oof. Well, I have no particular expectations anyways, just seems like a fun thing to experiment with.
It's amazing to me so many people expect privacy while blasting their mouth online. Everyone has been scraping that data for years.
- It's amazing to me that so many people have accepted a completely warped conception of consent and continue to argue that it's ok.
  
  Jesus Christ. It's a PUBLIC forum . My head hurts. I'll be here channeling my inner boomer at 38 apparently.
  You consented when you made the choice to use SOMEONE ELSES PUBLIC COMMUNICATION PLATFORM.
  
  Suggesting common sense pratices and understanding of how the world works isn't being supporting of the state of things. I see no argument in the comment you replied to that it's ok.
  Time isn't infinite, and if I have to choose only one option then I'd focus on helping people make their way through the world that currently exists, rather than focusing on impotent ranting about how things should be.
  We can't just snap our fingers and live in the world of how things should be. Until we get there we all have to live in the world that is.
  
  The issue is not the scrapping of public internet here, the issue is that reddit thinks they own my shit posting lol
I am Jack's unconcealed surprise.
My concern is that Reddit will still be one of the biggest social media site that hosts multiple valuable resources that had been gathered for nearly 20 years. This reason alone will not dissuade users from leaving. I love AskHistorians, but I doubt they will migrate somewhere, and the treasure trove of knowledge from the subreddit could not be moved elsewhere. Reddit knows this so they will continue with their shenanigans.
Edit: clarity
Interest rates rise, investors want returns, companies make cuts to make profits. Public API is just an expense.

78 comments