> I don't understand why there isn't talk and action to attack Reddit's owner and funding itself--Condé Nast. Like organizing to target advetisers pulling their spends off CN's publications, or people canceling their CN owned magazines and services, etc.
> Conde Nast were chumps when they allowed Chris Anderson, high on his own supply, convince them to buy Reddit for its supposed "Long Tail News" value.
That's not how it happened.
> Now they're chumps for not putting a grown up in charge
I like to think of myself as a grown up.
> converting 280 million page views/month and a dedicated community to enough money to support 4 engineers and a bunch of servers.
This is the crux of the problem. Marketing and ad sales is out of our direct control and has been lacking, so we've had to resort to other options. Self serve advertising last year was one of them, and it has done us well. This is more extreme for sure, but our plan is to eventually go towards the optional subscription model (like Ars Technica or Fark).
> Conde Nast managed not to destroy Reddit after buying it.
I would have said the exact opposite. The Reddit community was destroyed. People no longer recommend Reddit for interesting discussions or speak excitedly about its communities. Conde Nast monetized and changed Reddit, recouping their investment, and now it's hard to find people who have good things to say about it.
Consider e.g. /r/darknetplan or similar topic focused subreddit a that were thriving in the early 2000s - all graveyards today. Those people are on Discord now.
> Also, it seems like a BuzzFeed clone, which Redditors despise.
I'll stipulate that some redditors despise buzzfeed, but the population of users is too big for you to be that assertive. I bet you despise it, though, and decided that you are the protoredditor. Am I right?
> Reddit is having the same problem. The original founders were lucky in that it was bought out and they got their payout.
How is it having the same problem? I think it still has a decent shot at monetizing. And, I don't think it's going anywhere soon... it's like Facebook in its class, it's too entrenched, people are not going to move on to the next thing so easily. I don't even know any serious contender to Reddit.
> I feel for them. Figuring out how to make a giant free service profitable isn't easy. It's too bad the tactics they've used seem to be so off-putting.
I don't. Reddit could be profitable of they wanted to. They make a ton of money through Reddit Gold and ads. The reason they are not is because they have hired way too many devs and other staff, presumably because they plan to do an IPO so founders.and execs can become rich and investors make a profit.
> "...it seems like a BuzzFeed clone, which Redditors despise."
Part of Reddit's weakness is the Redditor mentality. Do I have to adopt their way of thinking, acting, consuming when I sign up? No, but I'm sure a ton of the mainstream is turned off by it.
Want to show some growth numbers? Target users outside of your core demographic. Re-purposed content re-presented for a different audience is a pretty easy way do that.
Did they think it was a competitor or something?
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