Reddit:
The Front Page of the Internet
By:
Matthew Gilbert, Josh Fellman, Avery Carter
Reddit
was created by Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian in 2005. The name comes from
"read" and "edit" or "read" and "it".
In 2006, Reddit merged with Infogami, another company made by Aaron Swartz. In
2008, after some changing in owners, it became an open source project, allowing
users to have access to the websites code. The website had always been
controlled by a third party until 2011, when it became operationally independent.
Reddit is a website for social news and entertainment where people can register
or be guests and submit information or just read posts made by other users.
These users are known as Redditors. According to Google, as of this year, the
main users of Reddit are male and are of the ages 25-36. Also, according to
Pewinternet.org, 6% of all adult Internet users use Reddit.
The
website contains over 5,400 subreddits to date. These subreddits are categories
for the information to be categorized in an organized manner. For example, if
one wanted to post about their cat, one would go to the subreddit,
"cats", and if someone wanted to learn about world news, one would go
to the subreddit, "worldnews." These subreddits cover almost anything
someone can imagine and if a user thinks of something that isn't currently a
subreddit, he can easily just create one. Users can also subscribe to
subreddits of their choice. Its slogan is "The front page of the
internet" and it is a very true statement because you can find anything
and everything on Reddit.
Users
who register are given a lot more flexibility when browsing the website. They
are also given a lot more opportunities to have fun and to have a more engaging
experience. Other than having the ability to post and comment, they are also
given access to creating subreddits. When a Redditor posts or comments, other
users can upvote them or downvote them (like or dislike), resulting in
"link karma" and "comment karma". These points accumulate
and appear on their user profile, which leads to judging of Redditors skill and
importance on the website. As well as karma, there are many other ways of
showing importance on the website. This is quite helpful for maybe someone who
doesn’t have time for the picture to load. There are novelty accounts, accounts
that are dedicated to one consistent task. For example, there are many users
called "bots" who are users that provide useful information for
viewers. One of these bots maybe will describe what a meme that someone posts
says. Another may be called "Let_Me_Draw_That_For_You" and it maybe
will draw something that someone describes and then will post a picture of it.
These novelty accounts are usually very well known around the Reddit community.
The
website is formatted in something called a bulletin board system. If you go to
the website, you will be on the Front Page. The Front Page shows you the 23
default subreddits of the year if you are an unregistered user. If you decide
to register, you have the ability to change the default look of the website.
When someone posts or comments, responses form a tree-like expansion to
effectively have an engaging visual design. These default subreddits have a
huge range of variety: educational, entertainment, discussion, and other. On
this Front Page, users will see what is "hot" out of all of the
default subreddits. Something is "hot" when a lot of other users have
upvoted or liked something that someone has posted. On every subreddit, there
are options at the top to choose from that will change the way that you are
viewing what information is visible. These are: hot, new, rising,
controversial, top, gilded, and wiki. Most of these are self-explanatory, new
being the newest posts, rising, being posts that are getting more attention,
and top being the most liked. Then there is the gilded choice. The gilded
choice allows the viewer to see all the posts that received Reddit Gold.
Since
Reddit is not really a website made for making the creators money, Reddit Gold
was created. Gold is something that a user can buy for another user if they
believe he is deserving of this gold. If someone receives gold, they are given
extra features. The giving of gold is quite frequent as it gives Reddit the
ability to keep their servers running. It is $3.99 for a month of Reddit Gold.
There are also many ads throughout the website that users will happen to come
across.
Reddit
has also become a social network. Redditors can add other users to their friend
list, giving them access to their friend's posts and comments. Reddit allows
people and gives them the ability to contact others for meet-ups or for
business-related activities. It has become a combination of so many different
other kinds of websites. Registered Users even have their own "cake
day", which is basically a Redditor's remembrance of the day in which they
joined the website. They receive a little piece of paper appear next to their
name for the day. It has also become a place for celebrities and Redditors to
interact with each other. These people include President Barack Obama, former
Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Morgan Freeman, Al Gore, and
many others.
One
of the top 150 visited sites in the world, Reddit has expanded to become very
modifiable. If you decide you want to view Reddit on your cell phone, there are
many Reddit mobile apps. Whether you are viewing Reddit on the computer, phone,
or other internet-accessible device, you have access to Reddit extensions based
on what internet browser you are using. These include the actual Reddit
Enhancement Suite, an extension that provides Redditors with many other
extensions made for Reddit-like websites like HoverZoom, which allows you to
hover over a link of a picture and it will show you it rather than you having
to click on the link to view the picture, and Infinite Scrolling, which allows
you to keep scrolling rather than you having to keep hitting next page. One can
download these separately or just download the whole Reddit Enhancement Suite.
Reddit can be an enjoyable site with these enhancements, but it also can become
a distraction.
So
much time spent browsing reddit, most of the time is well spent, but sometimes
there is wasted time. Although there is many strengths upon the website, there
is also some weaknesses. Let’s talk about the strengths first. All throughout
Reddit you have complete freedom to share your opinions, views, thoughts,
whatever you want to express. Now this might seem like a user can post annoying
comments or rude remarks, however there is posting rules. These rules vary upon
each subreddits depending on the admin’s rulebooks which are posted on the side
of the subreddits which are very easily readable. This makes a line which a
user cannot cross, or else there comment will be deleted. For example, if a
user posts a rude statement that has nothing to do with the information posted
in the subreddits, their comment will be deleted so it won’t be viewed for the
public. Another way for the comments or posts on subreddits to be viewed by the
public are a voting criteria called upvotes and downvotes. When a comment or a
post has numerous upvotes, their post will usually end up on the front page and
their comment will end up on the top of the comment section. That way all the
content posted on reddit will be reviewed by users and if it is popular and
liked it will be shared on the frontpage to the whole public to see. Reddit is
very easy to modify and personalize to your taste because there is a variety of
subreddits. Best of all, the whole website is free to use and is constantly
being updated by users across the world.
Time
to look at the weaknesses, even though there aren’t many weaknesses about the
site. One of the most aggravating problems with the internet is that you can
say whatever you want and others don’t know if it is a lie or not. This not
only applies to Reddit but every other social network because it’s all online
where you can create a whole new life if you wanted to. Therefore, you don’t
exactly know if a comment is totally true or not, but most of the time if a
comment is debatable there will be some sort of proof to go along with the
information, so it’s not always a lie. Reposts on Reddit are another problem.
Again, this applies to every other social media site but it is still annoying
to see the same post again and again. However, this is where the voting comes
in handy because if there is a repost it usually gets down voted so it’s not
shared to the Front Page. As mentioned before, there is an abundant amount of
subreddits, some are good and some aren’t so good, so it just depends on your
opinion and if you choose to follow the subreddits or not.
The
strengths truly seem to outweigh the weaknesses, making Reddit a very enjoyable
site. It all depends on your personalization of the site because you can make
it however you want; an educational site, an entertainment site, etc. The major
aspect of Reddit is the modification you have and that’s what makes the site
pleasurable. Probably the most appealing thing about Reddit is just the fact
that there is updated news by the second. Everyday users go to Reddit for their
daily dose of world news, funny things, or just some way to kill time on the Internet.
However, during the Boston bombing this year, thousands of users went to Reddit
and collaborated as a community to help the search efforts of the police. They
went online and created the thread “find boston bomber” and thousands of
pictures from victims at the incident were sent in. At first this seemed like a
great idea to the outraged citizens of Boston, but it soon turned foul. Once
someone was identified, the Reddit community had such a group mentality about
it that they ousted an innocent Brown University student and harassed his
family. Luckily no one was hurt, but it could have gotten worse. The bad thing
about having a site available to the public like that is that some people take
it upon themselves to claim that the information posted online is accredited
and is accurate.
One
of the most popular attributes of Reddit is the use of subreddits, or categories,
that Reddit uses to organize its extensive list of content. One of the most
popular ones is the “Today I Learned” subreddit. People use this on a day when
bored, procrastinating for learning things in school, or whenever they feel.
This category has interesting or random things that most people don’t know. It
can be useful to a certain extent, but the majority of using Reddit is just for
fun, which explains its popularity in the online community. It has become so
popular that even President Obama has used it, as previously mentioned. The
presidential candidate turned to Reddit in the final hours of the 2012 election
urging young people to vote and encourage their friends to do so as well.
Having a bad day? Reddit come to the rescue with the "Aww" subreddit,
feeding piles of cute animal pictures into your day just when you needed a
cheering up. Overall the coolest thing about Reddit is its versatility in
anyone’s online life, being the “one-stop-shop” for endless entertainment.
Overall, Reddit
has been created and modified to allow the best experience for the public. No
matter who you are or what you are looking for, Reddit is the place to be. It
has become a combination of all the great characteristics and content of other
websites put all together into one site. Reddit has truly become the front page
of the internet.
No comments:
Post a Comment