So much for Reddit

[Paul B]

For the first time ever I decided to use Reddit to get some help and advice on my latest woodworking project.
There are forums for the subject but the local one I am a member of is very cliquey (lots of old guys*) and unhelpful, so I no longer use it.

Anyway, I signed up and posted my first thread only to immediately get this on submission.



Huh!? That's weird.
My thread complies with all the rules so what's the problem?

I messaged the mod's and received a reply telling me that new members can't post for 1 day.

Well, that's not true, is it?
They can post, it's just that their posts are automatically deleted.

Some time later I saw this in my inbox.




So rather than restrict posting, or place it in a queue for manual moderation, it is just auto deleted.
Why not make that clear by removing the post button, posting a notice, or doing something which makes it clear that you can't post for 24 hours?

But guess what?
The reason I signed up is because I specifically want to post at that time.
If I just want to read I can do so without signing up.
If I have to wait for 24 hours to post, I'm going to go somewhere else.

Anyway, the mod's approved the thread so it's all good.

About 8 hours, 3 downvotes (who knows why ), almost 3,000 views, and zero replies later, I decided that Reddit is not for me and deleted the thread.

If that's Reddit, you can keep it.

I'll stick to forums - I just need to find a more helpful and friendly woodworking one.









* Yes, I know I'm also an old guy ...

 

[Russ]

Some communities definitely have some overzealous auto mods (bots), typically just to weed out specific things.

A lot of communities (including that woodworking one) have daily/weekly threads that are encouraged to post general questions in:

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When it comes to the downvotes it could be other users trying to get their content closer to the top depending on how it's sorted (hot/top). Once you find a nice community with the same interests, it's nice.

 

[Paul B]

I saw the information about the general threads, but my questions were related to finishing a specific project.

I guess I'm just old school and will always favour forums (especially after this).

 

[sbj]

I mean technically in your case it has nothing to do with reddit.

Each subreddit has its own rules and moderators and if enabled/programmed its own automoderator.

So, basically r/woodworking is like a forum on its own with its own rules and people. If you want to complain, then the target should be them and not reddit. Because other subreddits will behave differently.

A subreddit I frequently use has a limit of 100 karma for link submissions and 200 karma for text submissions (=thread). If you want to comment on anything there, you need 50 karma at least and your account must be 90 days old at least. I remember because I didn't understand what karma is and how to earn it, it took me like 3 weeks to get to 200 karma. Then finally I could create a topic.

24 hours is nothing basically. I know for a fresh account it seems a lot but reddit has so many bots and trolls. Without hard limits the subreddits would be filled with trash.

About reddit in general. As an avid forum user I was also hesitant to use reddit and avoided it for years. But all forums I used to visit are basically dead and reddit has so much activity it is crazy. I basically don't use any forums anymore except for native language stuff and a couple of exceptions because the English-speaking world has a subreddit for anything. And they have a lot of active users.

r/woodworking is a very big subreddit which means your -3 karma is a grain of sand in the desert. Since reddit works based on popularity, if you have an ordinary topic or an unpopular one, people just downvote and go on with their lifes. Don't put much into it, you will get used to it very quickly. Delete it and try a couple of hours later. And sad to say but you won't find the same level of expertise anywhere other than on reddit.

In addition their frontpage is extremely well done. You can choose from which forums (=subreddits) you want the most popular things to be displayed. That means everyone can have his own frontpage based on their interests. For example everytime I visit reddit I see the latest trending stuff about NBA, my own country, chess, couple of games, football, idiots in cars, uplifting news, dataisbeautiful, movie suggestions, and so many other niche and popular stuff like worldnews, europe etc.

 

[Paul B]

All of that means nothing to someone who wants to engage with a community but is prohibited from doing so.

No big deal.
I've already moved on.

That was my first and last post on Reddit.

 

[MQK8]

Anyone remember the Topix forums? I believe Reditt bought them out years back but Topix was old school and hardcore with an unbelievable following, even right to news in your local community. But I never got the Reditt phenomenon either other than some interesting articles here and there. But I know I’m the minority, people seem to love it.

 

[Wildcat Media]

I find it's a necessary evil in the few times I've used it. There are some technology subreddits that have answers to questions posted by actual users, vs. a corporate "forum" where information generally is provided from prepared scripts. I've found more useful answers there than anywhere else, in some cases. For others, yep, a forum is the best place to be.

The popular parts of Reddit are a freakin' trainwreck--mostly highly biased politics, ranting/whining, or memes. Basically a subsection of the cesspool known as social media...

 

[Mendalla]

I'm with @Wildcat Media. There's definitely useful info on there and it often comes up when I am Googling for tech solutions at work, but for day-to-day online interactions, forums are better for me. Not fond of social media at all. I'm on Twitter but that's more practicality. It's the best way to get all my local media outlets, including things like weather and traffic reports, in one place.

Even the fansite I am on for a favorite singer irks me a bit at times. It kind of splits the difference between forums (they call them spaces) and something like Reddit or FB groups so I love it when it is acting like a forum, but find some of the more social media inclined elements annoying (e.g. chains of comments on posts instead of threads as we know them). However, it's a nice bunch of people, it's about a topic I love, and they have an absolute ban on anything potentially controversial (no politics, no religion, etc.) which is a nice break from my own board where the heat sometimes outweighs the light on certain topics.

 

[Wildcat Media]

However, it's a nice bunch of people, it's about a topic I love, and they have an absolute ban on anything potentially controversial (no politics, no religion, etc.) which is a nice break from my own board where the heat sometimes outweighs the light on certain topics.

Ever since we had issues back around 1999-2000 or so, when we allowed politics on an early "off-topic" offshoot of one of my forums and things ended badly, I've banned any talk of politics and religion on every forum since. Even the topic of COVID is so polarizing on some forums that staff has banned discussion of it.

That old incident triggered a disgruntled member to start his own forum to bash ours, but it never got very far...since he carried a grudge, and didn't fail to make his feelings known. We took the high road and never mentioned his site or called him out. He pretty much disappeared after that, and kept in touch with a couple of our staffers via PM as time went on. When we found out he'd gotten cancer, many of us reached out with well-wishes. In hindsight it was a petty argument, and it was long forgotten as time went on.

Here's a good tactic--if someone starts pushing politics in a post: "Take this discussion over to Reddit." Let Reddit be the dumpster of the Internet....since most of the popular subreddits are already dumpster fires.

 

[MapleOne]

I find that site hard to follow and navigate, it's time they upgrade. Could you imagine it running on Xenforo software?

Super smooth finding things!

 

[Jake B.]

All of that means nothing to someone who wants to engage with a community but is prohibited from doing so.

No big deal.
I've already moved on.

That was my first and last post on Reddit.

That's essentially saying you posted on someforum.com that uses XenForo, and they deleted your post so you're never posting on a XenForo forum again

 

[Wildcat Media]

I find that site hard to follow and navigate, it's time they upgrade.

Reddit has a "new" version (which is the default) that has been in a continual limbo of "upgrades" for the past couple of years. It must be designed by committee, since each "improvement" only makes things worse. In the past, you could click the notification bell and go straight to your list of unread messages (which includes comment replies). Now, you have to click a few times and scroll to do the same thing. The old Reddit looks like a relic of 2002. I can't stand looking at it.

 

[Wildcat Media]

About 8 hours, 3 downvotes (who knows why ), almost 3,000 views, and zero replies later, I decided that Reddit is not for me and deleted the thread.

My take is that the really helpful subreddits are few and far between. Otherwise, the general public tends to reply to many things ("I washed a car once in my life, so I know enough to answer questions in the detailing subreddits"), and answers are often of low quality or total nonsense. I've found a few posts for very specific issues setting up my IP cameras using the iSpy application which had answers nowhere else on the Internet except in one particular subreddit. Same with some obscure things I wanted to look up with my UniFi access point or EdgeRouter, or my two Synology NAS boxes.

Any person who joins Reddit can start their own subreddit. So yeah...there's that.

I guess I'd say, "Use with extreme prejudice." And yeah...it's probably not even worth posting in most of the subreddits on there.

 

[BassMan]

Yep, I'm definitely not a Reddit guy. I don't know, I posted a few times, but also no helpful replies or just a strange attitude. I don't know. I like forums, specific ones, nice and pleasant communities, also not too big ones. I get lost there

 

[Mendalla]

I've banned any talk of politics and religion on every forum since

Part of me would like to kill political discussion, but the core topic of the site is Religion & Faith and being active in a political sense to advocate for justice and social issues is a part of many people's faith on the board so I'm prepared to live with it.

Ever since we had issues back around 1999-2000 or so, when we allowed politics on an early "off-topic" offshoot of one of my forums and things ended badly,

Another site I am on (one that is primarily for erotic writing) just took its "Think Tank" forum, which was the catch-all for things like politics and religion, offline. It has been gone for probably close to a month and no sign of it returning. But as with the one you mention, the place was a bit of a crapshow and many members (including me) largely avoided it, leaving it to a few borderline trolls who mostly just lived to snark at one another. None of them is posting anymore so not sure if the loss of it led them to leave or if the mods went wild with the banhammer.

 

[John917]

For the first time ever I decided to use Reddit to get some help and advice on my latest woodworking project.
There are forums for the subject but the local one I am a member of is very cliquey (lots of old guys*) and unhelpful, so I no longer use it.

Anyway, I signed up and posted my first thread only to immediately get this on submission.

View attachment 272492

Huh!? That's weird.
My thread complies with all the rules so what's the problem?

I messaged the mod's and received a reply telling me that new members can't post for 1 day.

Well, that's not true, is it?
They can post, it's just that their posts are automatically deleted.

Some time later I saw this in my inbox.

View attachment 272493


So rather than restrict posting, or place it in a queue for manual moderation, it is just auto deleted.
Why not make that clear by removing the post button, posting a notice, or doing something which makes it clear that you can't post for 24 hours?

But guess what?
The reason I signed up is because I specifically want to post at that time.
If I just want to read I can do so without signing up.
If I have to wait for 24 hours to post, I'm going to go somewhere else.

Anyway, the mod's approved the thread so it's all good.

About 8 hours, 3 downvotes (who knows why ), almost 3,000 views, and zero replies later, I decided that Reddit is not for me and deleted the thread.

If that's Reddit, you can keep it.

I'll stick to forums - I just need to find a more helpful and friendly woodworking one.









* Yes, I know I'm also an old guy ...

I'm not a senior yet but how does cliques work at that stage? Asking for a friend who wants to be cool enough to join one.

JK happens in all stages of life. Their loss Brogan!

 

[vbresults]

I give your post trolling/10

Reddit is great, but it has its weaknesses being highly centralized, larping, anonymous unaccountable mods, etc. I can develop these features privately for clients like I did with the older suggestion, but I know this could be a godsend for admins at large.

As part of that, I include automated moderation. It is one of my peeves with reddit, but it really depends on the subreddit and the age of your account.

 

[Muddy Boots]

@Brogan - What was your woodwork question ?

 

[JamesBrown]

That's essentially saying you posted on someforum.com that uses XenForo, and they deleted your post so you're never posting on a XenForo forum again

Thats a stretch.. it's still reddit, even if its a sub.

 

[Suzanne O]

Reddit is a load of overmoderated crap to be brutally honest.

I prefer my own forum.
It's not appropriate to overmoderate.

A forum i go on at the moment is full of overmoderation and it's a shocking place to actually post on. It's like reddit but much ruder.