Reddit CEO Steve Huffman today admitted that he had edited Reddit user comments that criticized and insulted him, wielding his power to anonymously change references to his own username, and replace them with moderators of the pro-Donald Trump subreddit, r/the_donald.
Huffman — who posts on the site as "spez" — admitted to the transgression after being called out by users of r/the_donald, saying he was inspired to edit the comments after a spate of insults emanating from the pro-Trump subreddit. "I messed with the “fuck u/spez” comments, replacing "spez" with r/the_donald mods for about an hour," Huffman said, indicating that the only thing he secretly altered was the target of the insults.
"It’s been a long week here trying to unwind the r/pizzagate stuff," Huffman said, referring to the ongoing conspiracy theory that links Hillary Clinton, her campaign chairman John Podesta, a Washington DC pizza parlor, and a clandestine pedophile ring. Reddit, under Huffman's leadership, made the decision today to ban a subreddit that had sprung up to discuss "Pizzagate." That decision was motivated by users posting personal information of people accused of being involved in the wild and entirely unproven conspiracy, but some users of right-wing and anti-Clinton subreddits such as r/the_donald saw it as Huffman promoting egregious censorship, prompting a slew of direct insults.
"As much as we try to maintain a good relationship with you all, it does get old getting called a pedophile constantly," Huffman wrote on the r/the_donald. Although stopping short of a direct apology to those he edited, Huffman did say he had overstepped his bounds. "As the CEO, I shouldn’t play such games, and it’s all fixed now. Our community team is pretty pissed at me, so I most assuredly won’t do this again."
Reddit's CEOs have been no strangers to criticism from the users of their site, but even after years of insults, taunts, and threats from random people, events like today show that public figures aren't entirely armored against online attacks. While it can't have been much fun for Huffman to be the target of abuse from a subset of meme-hungry Trump supporters, the insults pale in comparison to the the outpouring of hatred previous CEO Ellen Pao faced from larger sections of the site last year. Pao — who was seen as responsible for closing subreddits like r/fatpeoplehate and firing popular AMA handler Victoria Taylor — was able to avoid hitting back against her "sickening" treatment, even using the site to relax while she faced a firestorm of criticism.
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Translation : Don’t let your staff or people who are in any way "involved" with the site moderate the site/forum itself. Have professional third party moderators handle the moderation work, if you are unable or unwilling to do so, these kinds of problems keep coming up. Otherwise, be prepared for the ensuing drama that comes from such things.
If you’re going to get moderators, from worst to best – "Volunteer moderators" made up of community fans / MVP’s, Staffers, First party in house moderation team who is contractually bound to be neutral and not beholden to the site they’re moderating, and finally, Third Party moderation companies (they do exist these days, and some of them do a really good job).
Don’t they, Vox, The lot previously known as Gawker and various other large media groups who fail to understand the principles of neutral third party moderation?
By ThatFuzzyTiger on 11.23.16 11:07pm
Has anyone really been far as decided to use even go want to do look more like?
By buttstown on 11.24.16 12:41am
This is way, way more than some minor drama or a spat. We now know the following:
1. Reddit leadership can change history on their site, without a trace or a notification
2. Reddit leadership can do this on a large scale, on short notice – not just one or two posts, and possibly automatically
3. Reddit leadership (at least u/spez) can and has deployed this for petty, personal reasons at least once.
This is legitimately terrifying. Recall we know the FBI uses Reddit. But, since you decry pedophilia you’re fine right? Well, not if someone with no-trace access to the database changes your "Pedophiles are sick!" comment to substitute ‘awesome’ for ‘sick’. That’s not a fun prank, that ruins lives. Steve Hoffman has the power to essentially plant child porn or links to it in any post made by any user. Think about that for a full minute. Chilling.
Furthermore, #2 means these tools are powerful and aren’t new. u/spez didn’t manually edit this stuff, he changed boatloads of posts, and I seriously doubt he independently wrote a tool to do so on a whim at short notice. Usually you don’t make tools like this unless you want them. This is the first time we know Reddit has used them… that doesn’t mean it’s the first time they’ve been used. That massively undermines the credibility of the site.
Using any tool like this to literally change history – even once – means Reddit cannot be trusted. This cavalier non-apology isn’t enough. The resignation of u/spez isn’t enough. Personally, I’m removing my Reddit accounts and recursively deleting every post I’ve ever made, and considering making screenshot archives of the deleted comments just to be sure. For those who think this is going overboard, consider the risk.
By DarthVarner on 11.24.16 9:08am
How is this different than any other website in existence? I’m quite confident forum posts on countless other websites could also be edited without much trouble from the server-side.
By Aaron Hoyland on 11.24.16 5:20pm
reddit is one of the largest and most visited forum/discussion sites in the world.
By spinningquark on 11.25.16 12:44am
Better delete your facebook, twitter and verge accounts as well. They all have 1 & 2.
By trewtrew on 11.25.16 10:16am
The only new thing we have learned is #3. If you didn’t know about numbers 1 & 2 before… you were an idiot.
Reddit is a business and completely owns the website, hence the ads everywhere. Their employees have always had complete control over the existence and content of anything posted there. That anything at all continues to exists on their site is because they choose to allow it to exist there.
In the end you have the same choice you have always had. To post there or not. However most likely most people will continue to use reddit as there aren’t currently any really viable alternatives.
By whacko on 11.25.16 3:50pm
Remember when Stalin edited out Trotsky? LOL
By JamesXS on 11.24.16 11:31am
Like every other reddit user
By aditya.ravishankar on 11.24.16 12:43am
I think we can all agree that spez should not have done what he did.
in saying that, personally I thought his blazé confession was pretty hilarious, as was the seemingly innocuous name switch troll in the first place. We all have our bad days/weeks and to be fair, the shit thats directed at him on a daily basis is pretty rediculous.
By revolutn on 11.24.16 1:07am
Why shouldn’t he have done it?
What makes comments on a website sacred and un-editable?
The only thing this does is devalue Reddit in the eyes of people who are upset about the actions. If the CEO wants to give that impression, he should totally do that. Personally it makes me like Reddit more that they aren’t above messing with comments.
By interpol on 11.24.16 6:43pm
Because he is the CEO of a multi-million dollar website and he should be above these sorts of actions.
Nothing, but imagine if a respected/famous individuals AMA (such as Barak Obama, or Trump for that matter) was edited, especially when they’ve already gone through a verification process to ensure they are the real person.
In this case, as I said above i thought this particular edit was pretty hilarious and completely intended to be tongue-and-cheek; but surely you can acknowledge the potential issues that could arise with this kind of power in the wrong hands.
By revolutn on 11.24.16 7:04pm
Is this the same Reddit that threw its hands up in the air arguing freedom of speech was paramount and there was nothing it could do against racists and Gamergaters using it as a platform?
By Vlad Savov on 11.24.16 2:30am
I don’t believe so. I’m a keen Redditer and the one thing that’s consistent about their editorial decisions are their inconsistencies. I don’t pretend to assume they advocate free-speech, and hopefully they don’t either.
By sludders on 11.24.16 6:45am
That’s coming from this lovely guy:
https://youtu.be/uSVqoW1rz6w?t=835
By ocs on 11.24.16 3:02am
I’m sure I’d be tempted to do the same, but it seems crazy to make this out like it’s not a big deal. It’s a huge deal.
By GambaKufu on 11.24.16 3:54am
For who? I use reddit every day and I don’t really care about this since I don’t make it a point to go out of my way to troll others using the site. I’m sure people who feel the same as I are by far in the majority among reddit users.
By whacko on 11.25.16 3:55pm
Same, but that doesn’t mean I can’t see the problem here.
For example, here in the UK a guy was recently prosecuted for comments he made on reddit (hate speech). If the admins have the ability to edit posts without it leaving the usual traces, that becomes a legitimate (if slightly implausible) legal defence – the CEO of reddit wrote that, not me.
By GambaKufu on 11.26.16 3:05am
Trump people really have a way of making their opponents become unhinged, and then attack them for it. Think of Hillary and the Deplorables comment. Hillary called out the racists and other psychos who supported Trump. But Trump and her supporters turned that around to make it seem like Hillary considered half the country deplorable and she apologized.
Seems really messed up. I wish Reddit would just ban /T_D and send them to Voat.
By JeffWPa on 11.24.16 11:13am
Actually, I’ve seen Hillary’s "deplorable" comment mentioned several times as one of her largest screw ups, rule #1, don’t insult people that could vote for you.
By NorthDakotan on 11.24.16 3:29pm
I thought Trumpers liked when politicians tell the truth like Hillary did with her deplorables comment
By TrexinD on 11.24.16 4:59pm
Keep it up, 8 years is a distinct possibility and the number of conservative seats at risk for the midterms is what, 6 VS 23 dem seats up for reelection?
The last time Democrats lost this much ground was 1929, think about that for a second, 1929.
By NorthDakotan on 11.24.16 8:22pm
…I’m a republican but good try. I’m fine with the Senate to a point. Here’s the difference Trump isn’t a republican. He has no values, he’s a populist who will Court the worst in people and the worst people to win, hence deplorables
By TrexinD on 11.24.16 8:35pm
Maybe you should email the Trump personally instead of complaining on comments please.
By IamMyth on 11.24.16 9:19pm
I did. I’ve written him, called in, wrote my representatives and voted. You keep banging away there you keyboard warrior, you
By TrexinD on 11.24.16 9:56pm