EFFIE BATEMAN | Lifestyle | Contact
A woman who heavily relies on Reddit to help form opinions on very specific topics has been thwarted today, after a quick Google search found all of her answers blocked by the Reddit blackout.
Jen Armas [27] is said to have googled a relationship question by adding the word ‘Reddit’ at the end, when she was met with a page that said she could no access page as it was private.
“I don’t know what to do?” said a panicked Jen, “I don’t know how to form an opinion by myself.”
“I turn to Reddit for everything.”
The self confessed Reddit addict says she spends at least one hour a day scrolling the app, citing that nothing gives her more pleasure than judging people on ‘Am I The Asshole’ and snooping into people’s personal lives on all the relationship forums.
“It’s the only way to crowdsource an opinion”, she laments, “if I have a very specific question to a niche problem, I will always find an answer.”
“And I’m able to get multiple points of view.”
“Reddit has made me a better person, and it’s also made me a worse person.”
Thousands of forums have switched to private in protest of Reddit’s decision to introduce a paid model for third-party apps, which will make it creating and maintaining the apps unsustainable. Not only are these apps, such as Apollo, providing a better user experience, but also allows moderators of large forums to use moderating bots, as it’s not possible for people to spend hours each day scrolling through thousands of comments .
According to a statement put on popular forum r/pics, “Moderators cannot combat spammers, bad actors or the entities who enable either, and without the freedom to choose how and where they access Reddit, many contributors will simply leave,”
“The very elements which differentiate Reddit – the foundations that draw its audience – will be eliminated, reducing the site to another dead cog in the Ennui Engine.”
Letting out a huff, Jen says even though she will struggle with decision fatigue for two days, she understands and supports the blackout.
“I actually used the normal Reddit app like a chump, so had no idea third party apps were better”, admits Jen, “but I wish tech companies would stop fucking around with things that don’t need fixing.”
“Don’t fuck with nerds.”
More to come.
