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> Is Reddit mostly bots now?

Long ago, marketing firms became aware of the "just add 'reddit' to your product search for real human advice" meme. They're also aware of the fact that it's very easy to buy karma, buy accounts, set up upvote/downvote networks, and manage sockpuppets. Now I'm absolutely certain that >80% of all posts in product-related topics are fake. Bots, guerilla marketers, PR firms, reputation management firms, influence operations, you name it.

A lot of the personal stories you see on Reddit are also fake -- posted to farm karma.

The upvote/downvote system there, combined with anonymous accounts that have public post histories, has been a disaster for internet discourse. (Here, at least, it's gated and the community is relatively small. Also, the power of the downvote on HN is very limited, and only accounts with 500 karma can downvote anything. Over there, it's unrestrained and the downvote is too powerful. Reddit has structural problems.)

> Does anyone have any recommendations as to a Reddit alternative?

Forums still exist for most interests. They're usually much better than Reddit.

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rizs12 15 hours ago | parent [-]

I'd love to return to forum internet. I just don't know how to find them anymore because Google search is so crap.

Maybe a website, that links people to the forum equivalents of whichever subreddit they want to find an alternative to, would prove helpful?

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A_D_E_P_T 15 hours ago | parent | next [-]

That would be very helpful, but it would be a lot of work.

Might as well go all the way and be maximally ambitious: A modernized internet directory that functions as an alternative to Google would be a very welcome thing, in this day and age. I have some ideas for how that thing could work.

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doubled112 14 hours ago | parent [-]

You mean a big list curated by actual humans instead of an algorithm? Tons of work, but I also think the payoff would be worth it.

The fact that we have things like those awesome-* lists on GitHub make me believe it would be possible.

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A_D_E_P_T 14 hours ago | parent [-]

A human-reviewed and curated list that's comprehensive, searchable (everything on the list is indexed, nothing off the list is indexed,) and ad-free. Businesses who aren't on the directory, but would like to be, pay an application fee. The huge secondary industry that sprung up around DMOZ indicates that this business model would work.

There'd be more to it than that, but that's the basic idea.

I'd love to find enough people who would like to work on such a thing.

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codingdave 10 hours ago | parent | next [-]

You've already set yourself up for poor incentives, if someone is profiting off letting people in. It is not curated content if people are buying their way in. And if people are not buying their way in, you are setting up an elite class of users - the curators.

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A_D_E_P_T 10 hours ago | parent [-]

I don't think that's necessarily the case. It's impossible for human curators to catch everything, as crawlers do. Lots of companies are inevitably going to be left off the list because their website is #2,000,000 in the world & they occupy some industrial niche. Those companies, should they want in, would not be buying entry, but applying for entry, and their application would be reviewed in accordance with certain rules and other criteria.

Blogs and forums could probably apply for free.

I imagine that the still-theoretical company would (hopefully) profit, and that the curators are neutral salaried employees, rather than Wiki-style volunteers.

	▲	codingdave 9 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Salaried employees have a bias to make their employer money in order to keep those jobs. For-profit companies likewise have a bias for money. That is where all the problems started with - bias for money. There is quite a bit of social nuance to this, and coming at it wanting to make a better internet while also wanting to profit from it are difficult goals to achieve together.

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rizs12 13 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Let's chat. I am curious and want to hear more.

	▲	A_D_E_P_T 13 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Sure. I've added my email address to my account page here.

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LargoLasskhyfv 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Yo Squirrelz, R U aware of https://curlie.org/docs/en/about.html ?

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smackeyacky 14 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I consider forums being hard to find a feature, not a bug. They aren't all exactly like they were in they heyday of forums and not immune to bots and shilling but being j-u-s-t that bit more effort keeps out a lot of the trash.

	▲	Ekaros 12 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I feel like there is threshold of size when things start to go downhill. Too small is bad, too big bad too. In sense organic growth is the best for communities.

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pavel_lishin 8 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Other people have pointed out that a big directory will just encourage an influx of bots.

I would argue that word-of-mouth is the best way at this point, whether in person, or from others you know online.