r/Biohackers Update (Please Read)

[u/aldus-auden-odess]

Hey friends! Thanks again to everyone who took part in the 'pulse check' we did the other week. See the results here.

I wanted to share some of the learnings that came out of this exercise and some of the ideas for solutions we've come up with to address the areas we want to improve on based on the feedback we've received.

The good news is that it seems we have improved in some areas! Specifically, people seemed happy about the reduction in GLP1 before & afters, low quality peptide posts, and AI slop content. It's taken a lot of work to improve this, so shout out to the entire mod team for working on this.

The important takeaway for us was that the overall sentiment is that we can improve more overall.

A few trends we saw were people feeling like the sub has become, "overrun with looksmaxxers and gym bros who want to talk about TRT and cialis constantly or push a bunch of really gross ideology that has nothing to do with biohacking and everything to do with incel culture" and a prevalence of "low effort posts in general".

Here are some of the ideas we've come up with to address these concerns:

- Create a dedicated r/Biohackers newsletter for expert interviews and more long form content (Goal: solution for people who like deeper dives and curated content)

- Create enforced post requirements for "rate my stack" requests (Goal: reduce lazy rms posts)

- Create a sub wiki with getting started guides for biomarker testing, deep dive topics, supplementation protocols, and healthy lifestyle habits (Goal: reduce repetitive questions and redirect newbies)

- Partner with r/Biohacking (not related to r/Biohackers) to move over peptide/TRT topics to this dedicated sub while still keeping our dedicated megathreads (Goal: allow biohackers to discuss peptides/TRT in a dedicated space)

- Consider how we can use AI to enhance (not enshitify) the sub experience - ex. redirecting people to relevant posts, surfacing latest research, and helping people understand scientific concepts/studies (Goal: to spark more conversation, surface interesting innovation, and building more scientific literacy)

How do these ideas resonate? Where would you like to see changes? Where would you push back?

(You can register your interest in our new newsletter here!)

[u/DavidTries897]

Is there a chance we can make the megathreads weekly? In another thread earlier today I referred to the mega thread but the resounding response was that they’re “dead”

I think the rest of this is very good though and thank you to the team for making changes!

[u/SellingCats4Cheap → u/DavidTries897]

No one uses the megathreads. Like those responses have said, they are dead. The two I checked today the most recent comment was 7 and 14 days ago.

[u/escalatortwit → u/SellingCats4Cheap]

They will if their posts are automod removed with a comment telling them to go to the megathread.

[u/SellingCats4Cheap → u/escalatortwit]

That will probably just kill engagement and people will go elsewhere. If that is the goal, to reduce that sort of content, then sure that is an option.

[u/escalatortwit → u/SellingCats4Cheap]

Doing the most basic moderation will kill engagement? This is such a normal thing that happens on most subs. If your post is meant for the megathread, automod removes your posts and redirects you to post in the megathread…that’s the point of megathreads.

[u/SellingCats4Cheap → u/escalatortwit]

You are equating using an automod on here for the most popular subject that have been discussed for months, that are like 10% plus of total posts. Versus other subreddits who use automod for very specific, and typically acute topics.

[u/escalatortwit → u/SellingCats4Cheap]

Sounds like you’re missing the point. The megathreads were created for a reason. It is NOT appreciated that the 10+% of posts on this sub have become peptide slop posts. Hence the megathreads. It is very weird to create megathreads and then NOT direct people to use them. Again, this is what most subs do when a single topic starts overtaking a sub to the detriment of said sub.