this post was submitted on 19 Jul 2023
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same here but shorter time. why did it flourish more than forums though!? that's the mistery
Personally I think the format of upvoting posts to decide what people talk about, upvoting comments to decide what information/opinions get more visibility, and branching comment threads so you can have multiple conversations about the same topic is just a much nicer format than forum threads just being bumped because someone posted "bump" and having multiple conversations trying to keep track of each other in one single comment thread. Unfortunately that formula can be easily replicated so really it was just a matter of time before similar alternatives popped up. Same thing happening with Twitter and Threads, all you did was give people a different way to post Facebook statuses, you didn't really "invent" anything so much as iterate on an existing concept and nothing about the idea was that difficult to replicate once it was legitimized as a tried and true formula.
"Unfortunately that formula can be easily replicated so really it was just a matter of time before similar alternatives popped up."
I disagree on the unfortunate part. I think it's good that alternatives are easy to make. That means I don't have to put up with the shenanigans to have the type of forum I've enjoyed.
Well yes, what I meant by that word choice was "unfortunately for Reddit", but good for you and me! I'm loving that people seem to be realizing that it's really not hard making an alternative to what is essentially a text-based website.
The thing that is truly unfortunate is how much harder the same is to do for data-heavy sites for sharing images, videos, etc.
reddit awards were an invention and great idea tbh, especially in subs like ELI5 and r/math. Gold or star awarded comments were really dope
For a lot of people: Porn, and easy access to otherwise obscure interests.
I think ease of use helped a lot.
Ease of use for the moderators and end users. How many user names and passwords would I have to keep track of before? The effort isn't much, but it adds up.
I had a common usename and a common first 6 letters of the password. Then 3 numbers that were different from each forum and that was written down. Not great, but it would take some serious leaps of logic even if my system was compromised. I also took password generation more seriously if it was attached to a payment system, so things like Amazon, ebay or PayPal had much larger, more random passwords.