I was around at the time, but I went from /. and/or forums to nothing to reddit. I was also about 5-7 years late to reddit

What were the prevalent reddit like boards at the time doing such that reddit became popular?

  • CodingAndCoffee@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    22
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    Reddit back then was like a blend of what content we’re seeing on the “chat” communities here on Lemmy, and what Hacker News is today. It was much more technology oriented, and much less topical.

    Subreddits existed, but ones for smaller fandoms and narrowly focused meme formats did not.

    • hddsx@lemmy.worldOP
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      8
      ·
      1 year ago

      Was there a catastrophic event similar to the Reddit API change that led people to flock to Reddit? Or was it the appeal of the format?

      For reference: I started because my friend was browsing Reddit in class and it seemed like something to do. I’m not sure if I represented the general population

      • Aremel@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        17
        ·
        1 year ago

        I wasn’t around for it, but I understand that Digg was the “it” place until they did something dumb, and then reddit was flooded with Digg refugees. It seems like history is repeating itself, or at least rhyming.

        • Tot@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          5
          ·
          1 year ago

          I remember a UI redesign that looked kinda like shit, losing the ability to downvote and therefore bury paid ads placed to look like regular content, and something about a facebook connection but details are real hazy.

      • wildbus8979@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        13
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        “You [Digg] chose to grow with venture capital… this new version of digg reeks of VC meddling. It’s cobbling together features from more popular sites and departing from the core of digg, which was to “give the power back to the people.”” - Alexis Ohanian

        • bloodsangre7@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          6
          ·
          1 year ago

          I know that was ~12 years ago, but to go from that to “we will continue to be profit-driven until we are profitable” is one hell of a character arc for a website

          • Quit_this_instance@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            7
            ·
            1 year ago

            It’s actually a pretty common character arc, it’s just unusually blatant here.

            A different group took over, and money talks. That’s about it. That’s why if we want to maintain a non-corporate internet, decentralised social media are the only option available.

          • wildbus8979@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            3
            ·
            1 year ago

            Let alone Aaron’s principals. He must be spinning so fast in his grave that we could probably solve the world’s energy needs.

    • hddsx@lemmy.worldOP
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      1 year ago

      Sure, that’s how I came upon it too.

      Was there a catastrophic event like the Reddit API change that led people to make a switch?

      • bloodsangre7@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        8
        ·
        1 year ago

        Look up Digg v4. I was mainly a digg user until this point in Aug 2010. They redesigned the website and took away the downvote button. There were also increasing concerns from the frequent posters that the front page was getting more and more monolithic, you’d see like 20 stories from 2-3 websites at the top all the time.

        Switching over to Reddit at first was hard. The site wasn’t “pretty” like digg and the content was much more unfiltered. It was like moving out to the wild west - rough, a little scary, and had a ton to explore

  • jerry@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    6
    ·
    1 year ago

    Digg was the main competitor. They updated so that it showed where the links were coming from, and so many were coming from reddit it started a mass-exodus. In retrospect, it was the beginning of the end. A cool nerd hangout got mass appeal.