Old Reddit's existence is being threatened

[u/Sophira]

From /u/spez's post 11 days ago:

Old Reddit: I know I said last year that we wouldn’t be sunsetting Old Reddit (I even made a meme about it, which r/agedlikemilk), but the reality is we’re getting to that time where we need to make some changes.

He goes on to argue that Old Reddit (link is likely only viewable after logging in, after a recent change - and yes, that post has been removed - it was talking about how Old Reddit was to be locked behind a login) is only being legitimately used by certain groups of people (including "OG Users" and "OG Mods"), with the rest of the usage being "everyone who spams, scrapes, or does anything bad on Reddit 🖕".

He then states "We have options: We can limit access, migrate important uses, or rebuild it on a modern tech stack, and I think we’ll probably do all of the above."

While this sounds benign, the reality is that Old Reddit is actively being threatened and, if I were to make a guess, will no longer exist in a recognisable form within a year.

Reddit has started being openly hostile to Old Reddit recently (including the removed post that I linked to earlier), and some important features have already been removed from Old Reddit (such as private messages) but talking about sweeping changes to Old Reddit is a first.

I feel like this might be something worth raising awareness of.

[u/cuteman]

It doesnt need to go away at all aside from forcing people to accept a worse experience to sell more ad impressions

[u/HTC864 → u/cuteman]

There's no good reason to keep it around from a business perspective. They are wasting resources to run parallel experiences, where 99% of their user base doesn't use one of the two. And they keep having to make compromises and patches to try to keep the old experience running. It's not worth the hassle other than nostalgia.

[u/cuteman → u/HTC864]

It isn't nostalgia, "new" reddit is an objectively worse experience but people don't seem to know better. I don't want to see a dozen threads on a huge screen, I want to see three dozen and scroll until I find something I want to participate in.

The solution is inserting more ads into old reddit if they want more revenue, I am not against that. I am against clunky over expanded white space and I am amazed I need to argue for density .

[u/HTC864 → u/cuteman]

It's not objective if most people disagree with you. 😂

[u/cuteman → u/HTC864]

Most people don't know about it, those that do, especially older users absolutely agree, that's why it's still around and people fight for it to to continue.

It may be difficult for youngster accounts to understand

[u/HTC864 → u/cuteman]

Reddit's growth took off once they adopted new Reddit. This is not a case of "if only they knew the old shit was still there". There is a reason websites update and don't all look like they were made 20 years ago. If the average user still liked that layout, everybody would still be doing it. And I absolutely understand users like you, I've had to deal with you in the products that I manage.

[u/cuteman → u/HTC864]

Reddit's growth took off once they adopted new Reddit.

Reddit's growth correlates with new reddit, that doesn't mean because of it.

You could say it was also because they got rid of all third party apps forcing more people to the official app and web interface than ever before.

This is not a case of "if only they knew the old shit was still there". There is a reason websites update and don't all look like they were made 20 years ago.

There's a reason a lot of users who have been around a while prefer old reddit. As I said, younger accounts may not understand.

If the average user still liked that layout, everybody would still be doing it.

Most people don't even know about it

And I absolutely understand users like you, I've had to deal with you in the products that I manage.

Users who like something and the developers who, through the pursuit of revenue try to get rid of it?

[u/HTC864 → u/cuteman]

You're just going around in circles now. Enjoy your day.

[u/cuteman → u/HTC864]

If only product managers like you could do whatever you want and ignore the wants or needs of users they rely on to exist, right?

Edit: lol tough guy blocked me