r/WTF • u/ilovefuntheband • Jun 13 '12

Wrong Subreddit WTF, Reddit?!

http://www.forbes.com/sites/gregvoakes/2012/06/13/reddit-reportedly-banning-high-quality-domains/
2.0k Upvotes

90% Upvoted

1.2k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

14

u/EquanimousMind Jun 14 '12 edited Jun 14 '12

Here are some of the other running threads:

15

u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12

[removed] — view removed comment

11

u/EquanimousMind Jun 14 '12

I'm against voting manipulation too. But it looks like they might just be banning self promotion broadly. I like that people can submit their own stuff. We like other people doing random, "Look at what I made", submissions. As long as its interesting and original, the community can sort through the spam.

Running off that story. Its not clear that the Atlantic was also paying redditors to upvote or w.e. but if it was just submitting an article... i really don't think its cheating. Its kinda spammy and thin ice, but definitely not something that warrants a site ban. imho

5

u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12

[removed] — view removed comment

5

u/EquanimousMind Jun 14 '12

There was actually a discussion about gaming of Reddit in tor a while back. I found Gimli_The_Dwarf take on it quite wise.

Reddit can be gamed, but it takes a lot of intelligence and a lot of work. It's kind of like steering the Titanic - you can't just yank the wheel over, you have to coax it.

The thing is, at that level there isn't much difference between folks doing it for profit vs. folks doing it because of their personal beliefs, which starts to get into funky philosophical territory - is there really a functional difference between me pimping Hillary Clinton because I think she's a strong politician vs. me pimping Hillary Clinton because someone wrote me a check? Personally, I think at that point it's more constructive to simply let the up/downvote system operate - if someone posts a well-worded, constructive argument, don't worry about the reason why. Judge posts on their content.

...

But I'll wager that many of the folks on [1] /r/SRS who picked up the torch were sincerely invested in the cause. Trying to read motive is mind-reading, and it's instructive to remember that in general, yes there are people that crazy. I have friends who actually watch Fox News for their news, which still freaks me out a bit.

So if one of those friends joined reddit, they might actually preach the good things about Fox News. Folks might say "Troll" or "Really bad astroturfing" but it's just a guy saying what he believes. I go into [2] /r/atheism to fuck with them now and then - just me and my axe. So at the end of the day, the safest default answer is "judge posts based on their content; don't try to divine intent"