This is a better way to word my post.
2,011 karma · joined March 27, 2013
It's either the comment is misinformed, upvoted by other people who are also misinformed, or it is just scraping the bottom of the barrel for that topic.
I wish there was a site like Reddit/HN but on an invite/application basis only to consistently provide good content.
It's much easier to fling shit about a photo than it is about a very specific/complex product or technology. I can't exactly bullshit my way to top comment about something I don't know anything about on HN.
A lot of the users here, if you click their profile, you can find their startups, places of work, code they wrote, their blog, etc.
On Reddit it's a straight up free for all.
There are some great posts/comments in very niche subreddits, but when you compare that to the entirety of the website, it's a very very small outlier.
Read my comment as if you are only subbed to the defaults, since that's where OP's picture was posted, that's what I'm arguing.
The existence of a few rare good comments doesn't negate all the shit that Reddit generates.
Now picture that, and then picture 1000 other people just like that upvoting a post, and the cycle repeats itself with every link on and on and on and on.
> Why not? I get a ton of useful content from reddit, and find that the discussions in the comments are often enlightening.
How are you going to determine whether a comment is bullshit or not, especially on something super niche like some very specific question in r/Askhistorians?
You can't for the most part. I do agree you can find good content, but by design Reddit is flawed. The upvote system combined with anonymity is enough reason to be skeptical about everything you read.
How could I possibly be in a position to judge the truth of a post on a topic that I know nothing about? That's the problem.
By simple virtue of being on Reddit, regardless of subreddit, you are wasting your own time. It doesn't matter HOW good the top comment is, ultimately it's a gamble. How do you know if what you're reading is real?
Trust, I've been on the site for like 7 years now and I've been to nearly every sub deemed "worthy". Almost in every situation, I'd prefer an entirely new forum specifically dedicated to that topic.
By design, it's just a comment system without any features really, and that design promotes a certain behaviour, which plagues the intention of the poster in the first place, because it's not longer about sharing information, it's about sharing information in the context of it earning more upvotes, so the content becomes corrupt.
I truly believe after spending so much time on Reddit I became a worse person by being exposed to the same regurgitated/top voted opinions on things nobody should be talking about unless qualified (which you can't verify). I realized after a few years after taking an objective look at my life how much I had changed. If you dwell in a medium, you tend to absorb it, and that's the only medium I dwelled in. It's taken me quite awhile to get back to being a normal, nice, human being, sometimes I still slip up in real life. Every topic I've been exposed to ad nauseam on Reddit that I experience in real life, I have to consciously drop all my preconceptions on the topic that I developed online and look at it with a fresh mind, it's slowly helping.
It's a podium for anyone who has an unqualified opinion to suddenly voice it for no real reason. That, combined with the broken upvote system promoting terrible content is a recipe for disaster.
"Reddit: the front page of an on going Dunning-Kruger effect study".
You don't stand to gain anything from Reddit. The comments are largely terrible unless you visit very niche subreddits that are moderated and/or have verified users. You can argue that some smaller subreddits have really good content, but do they REALLY? Maybe you'll find a few cool links, some good comments, and an odd article or two.
The reality is, nobody who has a credible opinion on something is going to bother wasting time having in depth conversations on an anonymous message board, so how good can the content quality possibly get?
I realized how bad Reddit was when I started following comment threads and analysis on other websites on he same articles as Reddit. What was upvoted as total truth (top comment) on certain articles was just scraping the bottom of the barrel. It's basically: hunt for topic -> scrape some shit off the internet (be it wikipedia or whatever site) -> loosely compose it into some shit essay everyone will upvote with a strong ideal behind it -> top comment. This goes for every Reddit thread.
I'm mad and disappointed in myself for wasting so many years on it.
It's a shit flinging contest determined by fake points called "karma" that people, for some odd reason, REALLY REALLY care about, mitigating any hope for a quality discussion.
Great response OP.
edit: toned down the vulgarity of the original post
edit2: My comment is towards the default subreddits, not small niche subreddits that you have to hunt for yourself to find.
It costs, not a lot, but the time I save from actually walking and doing all this shit pays for itself.
I'm learning OBJC & JAVA via teamtreehouse as fast as I can so I can start building it natively for Android and iPhone.
I really can't stand apps that you're not absolutely thrilled to use, so I won't be releasing my current version.
Maybe in a few months? Anyone want to help out?
When you log your calories, you can only choose from the foods that you bought and logged. When you use them, the quantity decrements.
You setup reminders for when X food is at Y stock, and get push notifications based on that, an automated grocery list application with a calorie counter to manage your spending on food and weight!
Lost 100lb so far on it.
I really wish, but it won't. The system is solidified.
If they open this door, and then do anything against people using Snowdens precedent, the white house will be in a much worse position than now.
Let's say they pardon snowden, in the future, if more whistleblowers appear, all they have to do is say "but snowden was pardoned!" And then what?
That shit has sailed before it was built.