Reddit is Getting Rid of Its Gold Awards System

Reddit is sunsetting its current coins and awards systems, meaning you soon won't be able to thank a kind stranger for giving you Reddit Gold for one of your posts. From a report: Awards are little icons on posts you might have come across while scrolling around Reddit, and they're given by other users to show appreciation for a post. Perhaps the most commonly-known award is Reddit Gold, which shows up as a gold medal with a star, but there also reaction awards and awards specific to certain communities.

[...] Reddit does have plans for some kind of award system in the future, but the post only provides vague hints about what that might look like. "Rewarding content and contribution (as well as something golden) will still be a core part of Reddit," venkman01 said. "In the coming months, we'll be sharing more about a new direction for awarding that allows redditors to empower one another and create more meaningful ways to reward high-quality contributions on Reddit." In a reply, venkman01 said that "we want to create a system that is simple, easy to use, and easy to understand."

Here comes the 'thumbs up"

[Puls4r]

So it's gonna be either thumbs up, or likes.

Anyone want to get in on the betting pool?

Re:

[NoWayNoShapeNoForm]

Repleace Reddit Gold awards with RedditCoin. Just what everyone needs...YACC...Yet Another Crypto Coin

Re:Here comes the 'thumbs up"

[irving47]

They'll get rid of down-votes.

Re:

[Zekolas]

If I had to guess they will keep down votes. I have not clue if this is true or not but basically people can game the upvote/downvoter system by getting their post visibility by buying rewards, so why is this now bad I think reddit wants to sell all these posts to AI researchers , you want the upvote/down vote system not to be manipulated to get the best data.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

So it's gonna be either thumbs up, or likes. Anyone want to get in on the betting pool?

Ok, old-timer. I guess you haven't heard about this newfangled AI technology. Implementing this will ensure good content automatically gets rewarded, wrongthink automatically gets removed, and as a bonus, being able to say they use Artificial Intelligence on their site automatically means investors will dump millions into their company.

Re:

[tysonedwards]

Yep. And don't forget that moving Reddit Gold into subscription-only helps with ARR metrics, which investors love! Reward with things that are free, not with things that can REDUCE the paying member base because someone's post went viral.

Re:

[ac22]

Until the investors realize that the new content is just a watered-down approximation of the sum of the old content. Which is less interesting. I give it 18 months before the current generative AI boom peters out, when its limitations have been fully mapped out.

Only a matter of time before Google downgrades all AI-generated content, then it's done.

Re:

[DarkRookie2]

Ups

Re:

[SirSpanksALot]

Isn't that already the upvote button?

Re:

[Motleypuss]

My bet's on 'Thumbs Up's, just because the CEO seems to spend his entire workday with his thumb up his arse when it comes to doing good by Reddit. I bet one air molecule.

Re:

[mobby_6kl]

They already have thumbs up (and down) so yeah I'll bet you a thousand bucks on this!

Does it matter at this point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Stick a fork in it

Re:

[Cpt_Kirks]

The new Myspace.

Re:

[ac22]

Clever, but what's the new Facebook? Microsoft? Amazon? Google?

It's very difficult to supplant tech companies that have gained sufficient inertia. You could argue that 2 or 3 of those companies have been badly mismanaged for over 10 years, but IT DOESN'T MATTER. They stay out of each other's way year after year, occasionally buying up billion-dollar upstarts, and prosper.

Stick a fork in it? Good luck.

Re:

[Wolfrider]

^^ This. JFC, the post awards is one of the only fun things left on Reddit. I subscribed with a monthly renewal just so I could have Coins. If they're pulling this shit, I might as well cancel my renewal because they're just killing everything good about the site at this point. Just like fucking Yahoo.

What it doesn't mentoin is the "reward system"

[waspleg]

is paid. You have to user real money to give people "gold". So, how will this get worse for the user? That's very clearly what this is about, as with the API shit. They're trying to squeeze as much blood from the stones as possible before an IPO so fuckerberg wannabe can gold parachute like a champ on day 1.

Re:What it doesn't mentoin is the "reward system"

[Z00L00K]

To me it looks like they are trying to create a scam.

Given the attention Reddit has right now any investor need to be blind, deaf and stupid to invest in Reddit.

Re:

[mysidia]

Given the attention Reddit has right now any investor need to be blind

These would be the least-likely investors now. Reddit just ticked off the entire blind community by screwing them over when they blocked the accessible apps.

Re:

[waspleg]

I used to read a few subreddits semi-regularly and I do have some coins on my account still. I just noticed they sent this email:

Hello from Reddit,

Weâ(TM)re reaching out because you have Reddit Premium and/or Reddit Coins on your account.

TL;DR: Weâ(TM)re making updates to awards and coins on Reddit that weâ(TM)ll complete by September 12, 2023. As part of this, we made a decision to move away from Reddit coins and awards. This includes the 700 monthly coins* and Premium Awards, which are currently part of the Reddit Premium experience.

Youâ(TM)ll still be able to use your Reddit Coins until September 12, after which theyâ(TM)ll be removed from your account.

Note: all other current Premium features will still continue to exist, including the ad-free experience.

As we looked at our current awarding system, there was consistent feedback from redditors that stood out â" particularly around the clutter from awards and all the steps involved with awarding content. We also learned that redditors want awarded content to be more valuable. With that, we are reworking how great content and contributions are rewarded on Reddit. We will have more updates to share soon.

If you have further questions please check out our announcement post to read more about the update.

*This perk is part of the paid Premium experience.

Yea. I see no reason to go back. They're digging that grave hella fast. I've always hated their format but there has been some content worth going for. I'm guessing that will very quickly wither and die with how they've started acting.

Re:

[SirSpanksALot]

fuckerberg wannabe can gold parachute like a champ on day 1.

That guys an asshole.... fuck /u/spez

Re:

[fafalone]

For years Reddit bribed people to use God awful new reddit with one free award per week. Also premium subscribers get some each week. Then some awards gift the recipient with coins. I have ~2800 without ever having given them a dime, just from others awarding me.

Huffman wasn't kidding

[logjon]

He really does think Musk is doing a good job with Twitter.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

So many Musk Derangement Syndrome sufferers...

Re:

[ac22]

Didn't Musk buy Twitter "for the lulz"? Terrible business decision, as he belatedly realized, but maybe it's worth it for the $250B man who spends hours on the site every day.

Karma

[ardmhacha]

It's what every karma whore wants

Bring back Apollo

[SniffTheGlove]

What everyone wants is to allow Apollo back.

Really Reddit is going downhill so fast now that they are starting to dream up shit ideas to try and stop people leaving including all the mods!!

Re:

[alvinrod]

Has any significant part of the user base actually left? This sounds like a stupid idea regardless of anything else that might have been going on, but I haven't seen anybody showing that a massive amount of the user base has abandoned the platform. I'm sure there are some people who are pissed and wished that was true, but from my perspective as someone who occasionally uses it for some niche community content, nothing has changed.

What a lot of people fail to recognize is that 80% of the planet just want

Re:

[braden87]

I'm at a 95% reduction. In fact, I've been more active on /. since end of June than I have in years. That reduction is due to swearing off reddit on my phone, and that was the majority of my use. Now I'll use the shit desktop site if I really want info from communities that aren't rivaled elsewhere, but yeah I went from hours a day to a couple 20 minute sessions a week.

Re:

[mysidia]

Apollo we want back. I already cancelled my Reddit premium. This "change" is just an excuse to remove the coins from my account to make sure nobody can get some premium for free as an award -- they want to make darned sure all the premium users pay As part of their MILK-US-FOR-ALL-WE'RE-WORTH Initiative that began with the blocking of all the Useful 3rd party apps that won't pay extortionate rates.

Reddit?

[MindPrison]

What's that? What is Reddit?

Re:

[Opportunist]

Some former message board thing. If you're old enough you might remember BBS, just dumbed down so single-digit IQ dwellers can participate, too.

Re:

[bn-7bc]

This depends what subreddit you are talking about, a few of them are cesspools, others are really usefull, it might be time thst we stop talking about reddit as a thing unless ofc we are talking about the company that runs the infrastructure and the sw stack). The rest of reddit, the part actually providing the content are often moderated on a volenteer bases and there are, as stated above great subreddits.

Please look! I'm relevant! Believe me!

[Opportunist]

I'm honestly waiting for them to come up with a cute and bouncy mascot so they can pretend to try to appeal to users.

Okay, I'm fairly convinced...

[Voyager529]

Elon: "I bet I can sink a social network faster than you can."
Steve: "Hold my beer..."
Elon: "I'm still winning!"
Steve: "Maybe, but even if Reddit ultimately gets sold for a counterfeit wooden nickel, that's still a hell of a lot more than -$40 billion."
Elon: "...and where's *your* electric car?"
Steve: "...right next to that Cybertruck of yours."
Elon: "Double or nothing?"

Reddit mods sent your posts down the memory hole

[Mirnotoriety]

Deranged Reddit mods sent your posts down the memory hole. It's bad enough getting suspended/banned/shadowbanned. All your previous posts are sent down the memory hole. No advance warning, no reason given, no response to an appeal. At the same time they're happy to give sympathetic coverage to child groomers, sorry Minor Attracted Persons (MAPs)

Re:

[bn-7bc]

Yea bad mods are a problem, how big that problem is? I have no idea, and are there any reluable stats out therevthat tell us.

Re:

[Mirnotoriety]

Reddit is the only forum I've seen where the mods troll their own forum . Folks, here's one such strategy:

a. Ban sub moderator for no reason.
b. Then ban the sub-reddit for having no moderator ;)

Unfortunate

[rsmith-mac]

TFA is pretty much spot-on in calling it "iconic." So I'm really surprised to see that they're ending Reddit Gold.

As a decades-long Slashdot junkie I don't hold Reddit in high regard. But one of the few things they did well - or at least interesting and unoffensive ideas they had - was Reddit Gold as a proxy to let people gift a premium subscription. Letting people put their money where their mouth is by rewarding posts added another signal about the quality of posts - someone spent actual money on this reward, so the post probably has some value. Which to be sure, didn't stop idiots from gilding dumb posts now and then, but it was far more selective overall than merely upvoting, since it had a financial cost to it.

It's also just about the least offensive method I've ever seen for revenue generation on a website. It's purely voluntary (you don't get anything for gilding anyone), so unlike systems that lock features behind payments, non-gilding users weren't missing out on anything.

But Reddit also kind of screwed up a good thing a couple of years ago by adding so many more awards. Originally it was just Gold, and then a few tiers (Silver/Gold/Platinum). But once they added a whole bunch of reactionary awards, it became neigh-impossible to tell what award was what, or what a given award was worth. They tried to increase usage of the system with more options, but in the process made the entire gilding system less useful by adding a bunch of noise that drowned out the signal it previously provided.

I can only assume it still wasn't generating enough in revenues to be worth the continued effort. But it's a shame to lose it; gilding was one of Reddit's more interesting features.

Re:

[Victotronics]

You're right on all counts. I pay a couple of bucks for the ad-free experience, but giving out occasional awards is fun, and sorta meaningful. And yes, the whole slew of non-gold awards is ridiculous and confusing.

Re:

[Wolfrider]

> But Reddit also kind of screwed up a good thing a couple of years ago by adding so many more awards

Not really. They just made awards into emojis. It was occasionally funny+ to be able to award something like an animated waddling duck to a skating post. Picking out the "right" (or least appropriate) award for a post was sort of fun for me.

Refund Reddit Coins To Banned Accounts

[beforewisdom]

This policy doesn't cover banned accounts that have unused coins.

That should be refunded