I think they may be too busy handling their current PR disaster.
this post was submitted on 13 Jun 2023
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"Busy" might be the wrong word - despite a couple of one-liner statements to news outlets, they haven't released a single press release about the blackouts or even last week's AMA PR disaster. The PR team's got time whilst they twiddle their thumbs hoping this just blows over.
Reddit has 500,000,000 subscribers, and about 75,000 joined Lemmy.
I doubt they give a rat’s patootie about any of this.
(Numbers approximate based on posts I’ve been reading)
But those are some of the highest contributors, I'd bet. That 75,000 might well represent a hole in the Reddit's hull that will end up sinking the ship.
They're certainly enough that a substantial percentage of the total Reddit user population - at least the involved ones - are now aware that there is an alternative to Reddit. That's huge. As Reddit continues to go downhill - and it has to, that IPO is coming - and Reddit management continues to screw users and mods, more and more people will jump ship.
June 30th, the 3Pocalypse, will trigger the next major wave. Each reduction or elimination of NSFW content will trigger another. And I wouldn't be at all surprised if Reddit doesn't make more serious unforced errors along the way.
And spez et alia aren't quite as stupid as many believe. They don't care about 75,000, sure. But they can read the tea leaves as well as anyone else. Their major concern has to be that the emigration from Reddit to Lemmy could impact the value of the IPO. It's a clear danger, albeit only a potential one at this point.
Oh, they're watching all right.
I doubt they care.
I would say so. At the end of the day, Reddit is a propaganda machine, and they don't want to lose their grip on power.
If I were in their shoes, the question I'd be worried about is how permanent all this might become. How many users have left for the two days, and how many users will return after the blackout is over and at what rate?
People have been talking a lot about the "enshittification" essay, and one of Doctorow's points is that a shitty platform nuzzles up against the line where most people will be too frustrated to stay. Part of the problem is, you have to discover where that line is drawn. If nothing else, all this nonsense can serve as an excellent study in drawing lines.
Personally I've been surprised at how little I miss Reddit! Which goes to show just how much value it had lost, I think. I can't speak for anyone else, but participating on Reddit felt very enervating in the last few years. Will this be downvoted? Will this get me banned? Why would ANYONE downvote that comment? etc. It wasn't a safe place to be, but that's not the primary problem; a little uncertainty can lend spice to a situation. Rather, it was like being in a big room with a fairly large number of bullies, any of whom could also turn out to have untrammeled authority and the desire to abuse it.
I always felt that Reddit should have been run democratically. Perhaps we'll start seeing Lemmy instances that are run that way!