Hello !

As you may not know, the Reddit staff is implementing a new feature, which is a user-centered profile page feature: it basically allows users to post content on their own profile without "affiliating" it to any subreddit. Doesn't really look like a big deal from there, does it ? But sadly, this feature has far more important implications, that can very well be extremely dangerous for the Reddit community as a whole.

Now, before you think that I am only afraid of change, who doesn't care and will pursue its relentless march, crushing everything on its path, I want to clarify my thoughts. Change itself isn't, of course, the problem. The issue with this new feature is its ability to shift the content-creation role from the communities themselves to particular users. Still doesn't sound like a big deal, mmh ? But behind this abstract concept lies a real problem: as stated by /u/DavesWorldInfo:

This is going to pull people, both the individual posters (whether they're a company or a Youtuber or a random person who makes a thing that catches on) and the subreddit general users, into the profile posts. And out of the subreddits.

Why would a game company, a creator, a whoever who has a thing that's gaining traction, want to post in a mere subreddit when they can focus all their posts on their profile page? Where they have mod control by default? Where they can tune and shape what they're doing.

What happens to various game subreddits when the developers, from small wanna-be indies all the way up to triple A devs and dev employees, stop posting in the subs and post only to their own profile? What happens to new and upcoming creators, like binging with babbish or sovietwomble when they stop posting in threads about their vids and only post on their profiles? Or when they only venture away from their profiles to link back to it?

Why would I talk about starcraft in /r/starcraft when I can talk about it on /u/blizzard and know they might be watching. Because it's their channel? That destroys /r/rts, /r/gaming, and so on. The examples continue in the same fashion.

This changes Reddit, fundamentally. It turns it into a clone of something it's not. It removes what makes Reddit interesting and engaging; the collective gestalt of all the users rising and falling based on how they want things to go.

One of the default 'rules' of Reddit is "participate, don't promote." How does profile centric posting help that?

And I say all this as a content creator. If you guys push this change through, I'll use it for whatever it's worth. While it lasts. But me and a lot of other people will be looking for the next thing. Making this change go live and wide sets a ticking clock on Reddit's destruction.

The community is what makes Reddit work. Not power users, and certainly not companies showing up to big foot and massage and control their messages they way they do everywhere else in life.

(link to the comment)

So this new feature creates a few problems:

1. It lowers the quantity of content posted on communities, especially the smallest ones, by encouraging users to post somewhere else
2. It promotes power users, who will stop to be simply heavy content-creators / content-sharers to become entire "communities", able to limitlessly censor and regulate the activity on their own profiles instead of having a subreddit to their name, moderated by mods and having a real community able to speak out in case of abuses.
3. It officially introduces celebrity-worship on Reddit (not that it didn't exist before, but this feature makes it a part of the site)
4. By doing the previous, it allows Reddit to become more and more like other social media websites such as Twitter and Facebook, which a lot of users want to avoid.
5. And finally, it gives an insane amount of power to the brands, by allowing them to

Remove power from subreddits and their mods and give it directly to brands, something Reddit has been trying to underhandedly do for a long time.

(/u/PWL73316, here is the link to the comment)

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And the worst part ? We don't have our word to say. Admins may have answered some questions, but it is simply a way for brands to promote themselves, with the accord of the admins. If admins make money in the process, nothing we can do or say will be able to make them change their minds.

Nothing ? Really ? There actually a few things we can do to try to counter this move:

1. Exodus. In the light of the overwhelming amount of recent issues and "drama", it becomes clearer everyday that Reddit is coming to its end, and the need to a new and fresh website becomes greater for more and more users. Even as a temporary solution, it will clearly show the Reddit staff that their website lives by the community, and without its support, the website is dead. But nobody is ready to make the first step, and without a mass movement, nothing will happen.
2. Do nothing and hope that Redit fixes itself and everything works out fine. Well, it doesn't look like it's going to happen but as the French say, "when there is life, there is hope."
3. The moderate "solution" would be to simply to not use this feature: don't upvote anything, try to disregard this kind of content and never ever share any content coming from these pages (even repost on the subreddit of the user, if the user himself didn't do it before, if the content is worth it). It is important to boycott now before the big content creators start to use the feature. Yes, everybody is gonna miss a little bit of content but it is the price to pay to make the admins understand.

Please share this as much as you can, and spread the word !

Thank you very much for reading (I am not a native speaker, please pardon my English).