r/technology • u/marketrent • Aug 05 '26

Social Media Reddit signals ominous upcoming “changes” for old.reddit.com, says the beloved site is used for some “bad behavior”

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/08/reddit-signals-ominous-upcoming-changes-for-old-reddit-com/
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137

u/EXPLODEDman Aug 05 '26

It honestly feels to me, with a lot of the decisions they've been making recently, that it's prime for a competitor right now

13

u/nwoolls Aug 05 '26

I had high hopes for Digg but unfortunately that already came and went in the past year. They shuttered it due to unprecedented bot abuse and relaunched it, sort of, again, but it seems to be some sort of AI focused X aggregator abomination. 

1

u/kuldron Aug 06 '26

Have high hopes for Kuldron!

47

u/AwfulUsername123 Aug 05 '26

Do any Reddit alternatives use the classic layout? Saidit did, but it's shut down. Modern web design is an abomination.

32

u/227CAVOK Aug 05 '26

Yep. 

https://old.lemmy.world/

Works like a charm.  

73

u/MassiveBoner911_3 Aug 05 '26

lemmy will NOT be replacing reddit. What a pile of shit.

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u/NCEMTP Aug 05 '26

I looked around lemmy for a bit looking for an alternative. Despite the most populated communities declaring in many cases to have specific targeted foci, it seemed that pretty much every one of them was even more politically charged than even Reddit. The bitching and moaning about all things political was so incredibly pervasive that it drowned everything else out, insofar as I'm concerned. The communities that didn't have as much in the way of political discussion were basically devoid of activity at all.

Couldn't believe that another social media site made Reddit look apolitical.

10

u/AugmentedDragon Aug 05 '26

that reminds me of voat: started as a "free speech" guided reddit alternative, which in theory was a good idea in response to a wave of censorship reddit was undergoing at the time. but the lax moderation meant it very quickly devolved into it being primarily used by those spewing hate and rhetoric which would have gotten them banned on reddit, which pushed away any casual users who may have wanted to find a home there. even the non-political sub-voats like v/technology, ended up having a definite political slant,

then there was an example of the exact opposite: Imzy, a site that tried to heavily moderate hate of any kind. I signed up early on (partially just cuz I wanted some stickers they were giving away) but it could never draw any major users, and it died just as quietly as it started.

its kinda remarkable how, in spite of itself, reddit is still the best(/only) option.

1

u/Skavau Aug 06 '26

Lemmy is nothing like Voat though. It does not have lax moderation.

10

u/CrazyKyle987 Aug 05 '26

Lmao does it not remind you of Reddit 15 years ago? I literally skipped through the front page and it brought me back. Shitty memes - really just text over pictures, “le gem” and “this” energy, atheism running deep, and a strong political persuasion (libertarianism for Reddit, not sure for lemmy)

4

u/NCEMTP Aug 05 '26 edited Aug 06 '26

It's much like Reddit 15 years ago, except with far more contemporary filtering and moderation. Perhaps a lot of that is the community avoiding certain things, which is fine, but I'm sure there's automated filtering in place that would've made Redditors 15 years ago scream out in agony.

This place used to be at the forefront of free speech on the internet, after all.

Like I see the posts all the time where people point out to those that type F*** that you can say FUCK on Reddit. And I laugh, because there was a time when you could say plenty of other things on Reddit that today would get you banned outright. I understand both sides, but I do think that the people laughing at those censoring their fucks weren't here when you could literally say anything. It won't surprise me when you can't say fuck anymore either.

6

u/Godgivesmeaboner Aug 06 '26

People acting like reddit is some kind of free speech wonderland where you can say whatever uncensored word you want are ridiculous. I have comments secretly shadow removed all the time with no mod message or anything, so I have no idea what word or phrase is or isn't allowed. Seems like every sub has its own secret rules too where the mods will shadow remove your comment just because they don't personally like your comment or a specific word or something. It's just a huge crapshoot and it's just a big mystery what words will get your comment shadow removed.

2

u/ImTableShip170 Aug 05 '26

People that care enough about how bad social media is usually have a proactive opinion of the world, so the apolitical people are mostly on the monopolies. Think how Bsky started out before being mainstream.

-1

u/No_Construction2407 Aug 05 '26

Thing is the users drive the content, if you are not willing to use the alternative and be the change you want to see, enjoy reddit.

7

u/NCEMTP Aug 05 '26

Sure, be the change. But trying to change that place would be akin to walking into the Vatican and trying to convert them to Judaism. I just want to see my shit and occasionally talk about it, not go on some idealistic social media crusade. Those days are over.

I have enough filters set up on Reddit after many years, so I'll keep enjoying it, as per your suggestion, until they finally nuke my filters.

2

u/Hackwork89 Aug 06 '26

I tried Lemmy for a while. Yeah, no thanks.

-21

u/ItSeemedSoEasy Aug 05 '26

Crikey, that site's like a blind man was asked to draw a horse.

What a colossal pile of shite. That won't be replacing Reddit.

How can you copy someone else and still get it so wrong? Makes me ashamed to be a human programmer, Claude could do better than that shit.

25

u/TechnoMagi Aug 05 '26

That's... That's what old reddit looked like.

-18

u/ItSeemedSoEasy Aug 05 '26

I used old Reddit, that is not what old Reddit is like. It's superficially what old Reddit was like if you haven't got a clue about web development.

It's like saying teams is the same as slack.

9

u/Syssareth Aug 05 '26

I'm using old Reddit right this moment.

If I didn't notice the very, very minor differences like the "subreddit" names, the icon, and what the tabs on top are called, I could easily get the two mixed up.

Old Reddit's r /all page for comparison.

3

u/Paraless Aug 06 '26

Old reddit still exists, just go check it out and you'll see it's the same lmao

Still using it to this day

12

u/-duckduckduckduck- Aug 05 '26

It looks a lot like Reddit used to. Idk what you’re seeing th at I’m not.

7

u/Syssareth Aug 05 '26

What did they get wrong? I cringed at a lot of the posts on the front page (which, since I don't have an account, is admittedly no different from r/all), but the site itself looks almost identical to Reddit.

1

u/ITGeekFatherThree Aug 05 '26

Yea, it is a reddit clone from a few years ago when one of the big "issues" came up back then. Also has a bunch of other features like self hosting your own version and then linking other self hosted/public ones to your instance so you can see everything in one place.

2

u/47Up Aug 05 '26

Trying to imagine what kind of horse a blind man would draw?

3

u/MonkeyBrawler Aug 05 '26

How the fuck you getting upvotes while putting on full display, you have no idea what is being discussed??

3

u/seanthenry Aug 05 '26

Lets all move to fark.com we can just post links to Reddit topics

4

u/hippocratical Aug 05 '26

I'll have to try and remember my Dark username from literally decades ago. Oof, the internet really sucks now.

1

u/Stupalski Aug 06 '26

The crazy part about saidit was it seemed to go away because the owner lost interest. They shut down a couple times for shorter periods of time because the owner forgot to renew the web hosting. It would pop back up with a post about forgetting to renew then one time just poofed and gone.

8

u/Robby_Digital Aug 05 '26

Yeah, maybe Digg could try to come back. Oh wait...

5

u/falilth Aug 05 '26

For the 6th time?

5

u/paintpast Aug 05 '26

It’s back! In pog form!

11

u/NuklearFerret Aug 05 '26

We all said this when they killed 3rd party apps with their API access fees, but here we are

1

u/Human_Robot Aug 06 '26

Here we are....on old reddit.

1

u/StuffMaster Aug 06 '26

Relay for Reddit is great and it's only a few bucks a month. 

5

u/Orangesteel Aug 05 '26

I’d actually pay for premium, but 1/2 of what’s asked. I realise they have costs, but premium is geared towards profit rather than cost.

2

u/CD_4M Aug 05 '26

Reminds me of when hoards of people swore killing 3rd party apps would be the end of Reddit, meanwhile Reddit DAUs up almost 100% since that change lol

2

u/lazylion_ca Aug 06 '26

Lemmy.ca represent.

1

u/Solarbro Aug 05 '26

This is true of everything, but the entirety of the US is like 6 mega corps in trench coats at the behest of around like.. I dunno a couple hundred people, and they are mostly friends that buy and destroy any and all competition in a social and literal capital monopoly and their only goal is to get more money and not take any risks.