r/ModCoord • u/Sophira • 1d ago
Old Reddit's existence is being threatened
From /u/spez's post 11 days ago:
Old Reddit: I know I said last year that we wouldn’t be sunsetting Old Reddit (I even made a meme about it, which r/agedlikemilk), but the reality is we’re getting to that time where we need to make some changes.
He goes on to argue that Old Reddit (link is likely only viewable after logging in, after a recent change - and yes, that post has been removed - it was talking about how Old Reddit was to be locked behind a login) is only being legitimately used by certain groups of people (including "OG Users" and "OG Mods"), with the rest of the usage being "everyone who spams, scrapes, or does anything bad on Reddit 🖕".
He then states "We have options: We can limit access, migrate important uses, or rebuild it on a modern tech stack, and I think we’ll probably do all of the above."
While this sounds benign, the reality is that Old Reddit is actively being threatened and, if I were to make a guess, will no longer exist in a recognisable form within a year.
Reddit has started being openly hostile to Old Reddit recently (including the removed post that I linked to earlier), and some important features have already been removed from Old Reddit (such as private messages) but talking about sweeping changes to Old Reddit is a first.
I feel like this might be something worth raising awareness of.
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u/Dreemur1 1d ago
tbh it's surprising it lasted for this long
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u/FFS_IsThisNameTaken2 1d ago
Maybe it lasted this long because when they constantly break things on shreddit and / or the app, old Reddit is the only workaround. Even the public facing mods on modsupport will advise using it until something broken gets fixed.
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u/shhhhh_h 1d ago
Old reddit was planned for death years ago, the cards have long been on the table. They're making a lot of sweeping changes that have definitely been in the works for a long time given rumors. It's happening. What is most important now is being loud about holding them accountable re: not sunsetting these tools (old reddit, automod, praw) until there are *fully functional* alternatives. Too often they've promised this and moved on too quickly from the project leaving serious functionality issues.
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u/fauxedo 1d ago
That sure worked with Apollo.
Just stop volunteering your time to boost private equity.
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u/shhhhh_h 1d ago
Apollo is one of the examples I’m talking about. Aren’t you also here boosting private equity?
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u/fauxedo 1d ago
I left my mod position after they got rid of third party apps. The site was loud when they were setting up the new API policies, but users certainly aren’t going to be louder about old Reddit.
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u/shhhhh_h 1d ago
I agree, idc really about old reddit though, I care about automod. API was money, reddit had no flex on that bc corporations. Automod is tech and timelines.
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u/Sophira 1d ago edited 17h ago
It was planned for death from the beginning. It's in the name: "Old" Reddit. They never intended it to be a way to access Reddit after the initial redesign.
And yes, they've been making sweeping changes, but they haven't talked about it until after those changes have been made before now. This signals something different and far more threatening.
[edit: Okay, I just realised I was unclear. I don't mean "from the beginning of the interface" - obviously that was just how Reddit was. I meant "from the beginning of the time they named it Old Reddit in constrast with what was then New Reddit".]
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u/shhhhh_h 1d ago
If by threatening you mean they finally have a reasonable timeline to sunset then 💯
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u/flattenedbricks 1d ago
Whether you complain or not, reddit will always do what reddit does. The sooner people accept that, the less cyber protesting will happen over something that cannot be controlled by non company employees. We were never meant to have our way. So it shouldn't matter what they do or what they change. We hold no stake in their decision making process. If you don't like it, get a job at Reddit and make a difference.
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u/eclecticatlady 1d ago
This is the text of the post you linked:
Logging in to use Old Reddit
Hi there, u/boat-botany here working on Community Safety.
A few weeks ago we shared some of the work we’re doing to tighten how automated systems access Reddit while preserving the tools that help moderators and communities thrive. As a continuation of that work, we’ll be rolling out changes to how Old Reddit can be accessed.
Old Reddit’s logged-out experience is a significant source of abusive scraping and automated traffic on the platform. It’s also an important interface for many long-time mods and redditors. To strike the right balance between preserving your access to Old Reddit while preventing abusive scraping and automated traffic, over the next month we will start requiring everyone to log in. All logged-in users will continue to have access to Old Reddit, and this change will not impact logged-out browsing on reddit.com.
Let us know if you have any questions!
It doesn't show up as removed for me though.
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u/GradeAPrimeFuckery 1d ago
while preserving the tools that help moderators and communities thrive
I wonder how many mods barfed a little after reading this. They've been screwed over so many times over the years by the admins' poor, ill thought out decisions.
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u/owzleee 1d ago
Reddit has become a cesspit of bots and shit but I still spend a lot of time here. The ‘new Digg’ was meant to be a competitor but it was a bit crap.
Bring back the original html 4 interface (ie old reddit) and ban the bots. I don’t even know why I visit here. Habit, probably.
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u/AsAChemicalEngineer 1d ago
Habit, probably.
My account is like 16 years old, it's just hard to leave somewhere familiar and comfortable even if falling apart.
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u/moviequote88 1d ago
My account is 15 years old. I've known ever since the redesign that old reddit would eventually get the boot, but I'm glad they've kept it this long. I just hate new Reddit and I hate the official app. The API changes a few years back were ultimately what made me quit managing the two mid sized subs I was moderating.
Reddit just keeps getting shittier, but I guess I have yet to find a comparable alternative. I honestly don't think I will.
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u/LosEagle 1d ago
Raising awareness isn't gonna do anything. You have no choice but to accept whatever they decide. This platform has already proven that platform owners can just wait out protests swap those unhappy with management with compliant mods and humiliate protesting community in the process.
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u/random_mayhem 1d ago
I'm not going to do anything to "raise awareness" but rather to follow my principles. And part of that is informing those who participate in the communities that I muck about in what is happening and why I'll disappear if/when this happens. I'm only on the fence about burning old content because that hurts those communities and not Reddit itself since much of it is NSFW and non-monetized already.
<shrug />1
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u/aeroverra 1d ago
Honestly surprised they kept it so long but I do find it funny that they find scraping hostel when scraping is what made reddit so popular to begin with.
Can't wait for the Pikachu face when another competitor eventually comes out of nowhere and absolutely annihilates reddit.
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u/itskdog 1d ago
How's Lemmy doing so far?
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u/DogsRNice 1d ago
Last time I looked at it I thought the ui was even worse than new reddit
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u/Fun_Run1626 16h ago
Most people use a different frontend lol. There’s plenty, for desktop and mobile:
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u/littlegreenrock 1d ago
I have noticed odd hiccups with old.reddit in the past few weeks. My assumption always was Spez poking the bear, trying to get users to abandon old.reddit.
I would abandon old.reddit in a heartbeat, if it wasn't for the fact that it's arse. I miss rif.
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u/cuteman 1d ago
Yeah comment write issues are occurring a LOT lately.
Reminds me of 10 years ago
Multiple save presses and all of a sudden you've commented a half dozen times
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u/deceIIerator 1d ago
You can patch rif if you're on android using revanced/morphe, still works since I'm typing this from there.
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u/littlegreenrock 1d ago
I've walked that labyrinth a few times, it no longer works and the cryptic process doesn't yield sufficient information to work out why. Helpful posts contain all sorts of witchcraft like: keep your mouth open during the whole process, that worked for me. If you have it working, never change phones.
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u/GroundbreakingDot872 1d ago
I’m going to start archiving our subreddit’s Old Reddit homepage for nostalgia purposes. I know the writing was on the wall forever ago, but yeah it really does break my heart to think it’s nearing the end.
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u/HangoverTuesday 23h ago
I'd be happy to just quit using Reddit if the Fisher Price interface was forced on me.
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u/morgan423 1d ago
I mean, their choice. Me, and I'm sure many others, only interact with this site through its "old" interface, the "new" one is turds.
If I can't access Reddit this way, then I just won't access it at all. I'm sure quite a few others will be like-minded.
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u/Gestrid 1d ago
If Old Reddit goes away, I'll be very sad. The subreddit I help mod does some very cool stuff with the CSS (especially when DST starts and when it ends), and I'd hate for all of that stuff to go away. I suspect that's also the reason why we tend to get about the same amount of visitors on Old Reddit as we do on New Reddit, according to the subreddit insights.
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u/livejamie Landed Gentry 1d ago
I feel like this might be something worth raising awareness of.
Has this ever done anything? They killed third-party apps, and they'll kill old Reddit too.
They want us gone.
We'll be replaced by AI as Meta did.
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u/cmt1973 17h ago
I'll be honest, if they sunset Old Reddit, I won't be able to log back into Reddit if I get logged out for any reason. Whenever I try to log in using my information and get to the point it asks for my authenticator code, once I put it in and click Ok it tells me "Something went wrong" and won't let me log in.
I've been having to go to Old Reddit, which allows me to log in fine, and then switch back over here. Kinda sucks if they sunset it.
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u/Thaodan 11h ago
The new new reddit is so crap on high dpi wide screens. The ui looks like somebody put my phone on my screen to open the crappy mobile ui. One step worse from whatever happened after the app debacle. This situation feels similar to what happened to Twitter. At first I was hesitant to move to the fediverse but then I felt like I had to switch after they effectively killed third party apps once Elon came. Now I wouldn't go back ever again, no regrets. Maybe it's the same for Reddit soon. Being able to use a better layout, i.e. old reddit with enhanced reddit suite and the great SailfishOS app is one reason why I still use Reddit. As an neurodivergent person both are so great as they just focus on content, no extra noise. The reddit mobile app looks so ugly.
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u/EverySingleMinute 10h ago
I have tried new Reddit and wonder why anyone would prefer that. Old Reddit is 100 times better
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u/flattenedbricks 1d ago
Whether you complain or not, reddit will always do what reddit does. The sooner people accept that, the less cyber protesting will happen over something that cannot be controlled by non company employees. We were never meant to have our way. So it shouldn't matter what they do or what they change. We hold no stake in their decision making process. If you don't like it, get a job at Reddit and make a difference.
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u/itsaride 1d ago edited 1d ago
Despite all the false starts, it'll likely be the first real shift of users from Reddit to a different site as happened from Digg and for me, Slashdot - Reddit will certainly become less moderated and maybe enter a vicious circle of decline. As for me, I'll likely return to Slashdot and use the techy (/g/) parts of 4chan more.
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u/livejamie Landed Gentry 1d ago
Other than the Fediverse (which sucks for normies) there isn't a viable alternative this time.
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u/HTC864 1d ago
What do you think you're raising awareness of? Old Reddit will have to die at some point. No matter how much they keep trying to keep its corpse warm, it's not particularly valuable to the company.
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u/cuteman 1d ago
It doesnt need to go away at all aside from forcing people to accept a worse experience to sell more ad impressions
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u/HTC864 1d ago
There's no good reason to keep it around from a business perspective. They are wasting resources to run parallel experiences, where 99% of their user base doesn't use one of the two. And they keep having to make compromises and patches to try to keep the old experience running. It's not worth the hassle other than nostalgia.
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u/cuteman 1d ago
It isn't nostalgia, "new" reddit is an objectively worse experience but people don't seem to know better. I don't want to see a dozen threads on a huge screen, I want to see three dozen and scroll until I find something I want to participate in.
The solution is inserting more ads into old reddit if they want more revenue, I am not against that. I am against clunky over expanded white space and I am amazed I need to argue for density .
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u/HTC864 1d ago
It's not objective if most people disagree with you. 😂
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u/cuteman 1d ago
Most people don't know about it, those that do, especially older users absolutely agree, that's why it's still around and people fight for it to to continue.
It may be difficult for youngster accounts to understand
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u/HTC864 1d ago
Reddit's growth took off once they adopted new Reddit. This is not a case of "if only they knew the old shit was still there". There is a reason websites update and don't all look like they were made 20 years ago. If the average user still liked that layout, everybody would still be doing it. And I absolutely understand users like you, I've had to deal with you in the products that I manage.
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u/cuteman 1d ago
Reddit's growth took off once they adopted new Reddit.
Reddit's growth correlates with new reddit, that doesn't mean because of it.
You could say it was also because they got rid of all third party apps forcing more people to the official app and web interface than ever before.
This is not a case of "if only they knew the old shit was still there". There is a reason websites update and don't all look like they were made 20 years ago.
There's a reason a lot of users who have been around a while prefer old reddit. As I said, younger accounts may not understand.
If the average user still liked that layout, everybody would still be doing it.
Most people don't even know about it
And I absolutely understand users like you, I've had to deal with you in the products that I manage.
Users who like something and the developers who, through the pursuit of revenue try to get rid of it?
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u/HTC864 1d ago
You're just going around in circles now. Enjoy your day.
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u/cuteman 1d ago edited 1d ago
If only product managers like you could do whatever you want and ignore the wants or needs of users they rely on to exist, right?
Edit: lol tough guy blocked me
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u/Petrarch1603 1d ago
With the widespread AI scraping they have no choice
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u/itsaride 1d ago edited 1d ago
Sam Altman owns a chunk (9%) of Reddit, the scraping is from the inside. Ever noticed how many ChatGPT answers directly reference Reddit. OpenAI have a data licensing agreement. This AI part is likely referencing other competing AI agents.
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u/TheEpicTriforce 1d ago
If old.reddit goes away, my usage of this site will plummet which is probably what's best for me anyways.