Reddit CEO shares major platform updates in new shareholder letter: Rollout starts outside the US
Is Reddit becoming “increasingly painful” to use?
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- Reddit plans to test logged-in experience in markets outside the US first.
- CEO Steve Huffman says the change could boost engagement, advertising, and control over Reddit’s data.
- Some users say mandatory login would make Reddit harder to use.
Key Takeaways by nexos.ai, reviewed by Cybernews staff.
The days of users being able to browse Reddit without an account are coming to an end.
To retain new audiences, Reddit is shifting to “a logged-in-only experience,” wrote Reddit’s CEO Steve Huffman in an email addressed to the platform’s shareholders.
We don’t yet know if the change will be implemented globally. Reddit will first test it in markets outside the US.
Huffman also didn’t provide information about what the platform will look like for those without an account.
“Moving to primarily logged-in will ensure our users have the best Reddit experience possible, and can find the content and communities most relevant to them,” explained Reddit’s CEO.
The co-founder also added that this move is better for the business, as it should lead to higher engagement and advertising opportunities.
Logging in to Reddit would also allow the platform to “protect access to Reddit’s extremely valuable corpus of data,” wrote Huffman.
Reddit has been fighting AI companies over their data-scraping practices. Last year, Reddit accused Perplexity and three other AI companies of stealing its data by scraping Google search results that included the platform’s content.
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Users against mandatory login
“Insert ‘Time to leave reddit’ comments. Which, honestly, yeah, it might be time to,” wrote one user.
While some users were looking for alternatives, others named social media platforms they stopped using after logging in became mandatory.
“Twitter forced everyone to log in to view content. I stopped using Twitter,” shared one Redditor.
“I've been working to break what may be an actual addiction to social media, and I just want to thank Reddit for working with me by making Reddit increasingly painful to use,” added another user.
Reddit will force everyone to log in / Reddit is becoming a ‘logged-in-only experience,’ says CEO Steve Huffman.
by u/MarvelsGrantMan136 in technology
The news prompted many users to share their sentiment over the old Reddit, when it was “wild and crazy,” with “nerds, experts, hobbyists, etc. sharing knowledge, info, and having fun.”
Users can still access the previous version of the platform, Old Reddit, but they’re required to log in to it as well.
