They did not provide a reason. There was no further dialog. I just got a system message telling me I was removed.

I was also silmultaniously shadow banned from Reddit and my posts and comments stopped showing up. I had created a post complaining about being removed as the moderator (the only moderator for over a decade) of a sub that I built from the ground up and donated literally thousands of volunteer hours to over the last 14 years. It had zero upvotes or downvotes or comments and was not visible as an anon user.

In the end, I decided to rip the bandaid off and killed my 16.5 year account. I was one of the early supporters of Reddit (user #7758) and had left Digg for good in May of 2007 after the AAC controversy. They showed their authoritarian side in that moment and I knew Digg had reached their high water mark.

Reddit is at that moment now. They won’t be dead tomorrow. They won’t be dead next week. However, it will also never be the same, and it’s only downhill from here.

Much like Digg. Much like Myspace. I am sure there will be a blurb a few years from now as an addendum in some business journal how Reddit sold to a third party for an undisclosed sum and some Skittles…

The future is the Fediverse and I’m glad I was forced to remove my Reddit crutch and dive in full force.

Edit 1: The messages are starting to come in faster than I can reply. Thanks for all the well wishes!

Edit 2: I’ll also add, that I was never going to re-open the sub because I knew Reddit wasn’t going to yield. Thus, I was prepared for the outcome. I did hope to string them along for a bit longer and waste resources, but you can’t win them all.

  • Jim Vernon@techhub.social
    3·
    1 year ago

    @PippinVanderspiegel @vaprz I’d dispute that he gained nothing from “the sale of his soul”. We all get something out of posting online, even if we’re not paid for it. Money isn’t the only thing of value one can receive. I greatly value the discussions I’ve had over the years and the knowledge I’ve gained from anonymous posters contributions. I don’t think I’d even have the job I have today without online exchanges between people looking for and giving out helpful information.

    • PippinVanderspiegel@kbin.social
      4·
      1 year ago

      It’s a fair point but, I think, misses the gist of her argument. Humdog was super famous back in the 90s as a prolific online poster. Her entire life was pretty much online at a time when that was highly unusual. Keeping in mind that this was back in 1994 (so one year after the World Wide Web came into existence) and the prevailing attitude of most people back then was that the internet was a great leveller that would remove hierarchy from society and give power to the individual.

      Her point was simply that the nature of posting on a large corporation’s computer network actually gave more power to these companies than to the user. She wasn’t saying that posting online was pointless or valueless.

      She was pretty much the first person to ever say this.