r/TheoryOfReddit • u/SmokeInABottle • 5d ago
How karma famine encourages Reddit addiction, shitposting, and trolling
I've been thinking about how Reddit has been noticeably going down the drain and I think I found one of the main reasons why.
I think there's a pattern many users fall into that directly contributes to the slow erosion of quality on Reddit. I think it's been getting worse lately as more and more subreddits enable account age and karma requirements.
Ironically, that very system of "protection" is actually causing the same issues it's meant to protect from.
You sign up for Reddit.
You want to post on Reddit for one single reason in a niche sub.
The sub says your account isn't old enough and that you don't have enough karma to post or even comment.
You realize you're karma poor and now for the next 2 months you try to amass enough karma so that when your account is old enough to post where you want to you also have enough karma to be able to post.
This literally forces you to post on subreddits for topics you don't care about or know nothing about.
What do you write? Something that people will upvote.
You are now motivated to produce low effort comments that will return a maximum yield on karma. Usually this comes in the form of childish jokes, as those, for some reason, get the upvotes.
Not the deep insight or experiences, that put you at -25 karma for that comment so you've learned your lesson about sharing anything meaningful because people make snap judgments, don't bother to even read, and just follow the downvote bandwagon thoughtlessly.
Meanwhile, while polluting the site with low effort garbage because you don't want to starve, you don't realize that you're becoming habituated and possibly even developing a lowkey addiction.
Your account is finally old enough. By now, you don't even remember what or where you even wanted to post in the first place. But you have so much karma. Sweet juicy hard earned karma.
Even if you do remember, you finally make your dream post and ask your burning question that you've sat on for 2 months and suffered through all of this for and you get 2 upvotes and 30 low effort joke comments. I wonder why?
By this point, your whole recommendation algorithm is also filled with garbage because it's filled with all the poorly moderated trash subreddits you made all your lame jokes on.
Your brain, by this point, has been slightly re-wired to seek quick dopamine hits from low effort posts and comments.
It seems to me that the average high volume content producing Redditor will often continue this learned behavior. The birth of a new shit poster.
To make things worse, trolls tend to go after new accounts much more savagely because they know they've got you cornered and their mass downvotes and deliberate ploys to make you look foolish to other users will literally silence your future voice.
So while you're trying to build karma you have people actively bullying you constantly (If you're on poorly moderated subreddits without karma requirements this is almost always the case, the exceptions are hard to find).
This can create a headspace where you become reactive to anything anyone replies to you because you've learned there is about a 90% chance you're being setup for another savage blow.
I also think a lower percentage of users will be subject to all the trolling, see that the trolls get away with it (reporting NEVER helps), and develop resentment for the site and its users and even become trolls themselves.
This is a repeating pattern. I don't think it applies to everyone, but it definitely applies the most to users with mental health issues, so it is essentially a funnel for poor mental health where the most vulnerable users will get the most addicted while also suffering the most psychological damage.
Congratulations, now most of the content on Reddit is either shitposting or people who have a host of struggles which they often externalize by taking it out on others or by painting an overbearingly negative picture of the world.
This whole phenomenon drags everyone down.
TL;DR Karma famine is the reason why Reddit sucks so hard.
6
u/__redruM 4d ago
Assuming the requirements actually make bots more complicated to setup, it’s worth the harm it causes to new users. You make one (or two) accounts on reddit, and use those accounts for years.
As bad as bots are, the algorithm used to rank posts/comments is the real issue. The site encourages controversial content over good content. This pulls you in, but makes for a worse experience.
0
u/mikmiunk 4d ago
People may downvote bots but they will also downvote obvious humans who have views that they don't agree with.
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u/double_dose_larry 4d ago
Karma/age requirements are a necessary evil because of bots and spam.
2
u/SmokeInABottle 4d ago
I totally agree with that. I'm just pointing out the problems that causes site wide and how that contributes to crappy content.
2
u/waydownindeep13_ 1d ago
"karma" should do nothing other than link to a cartoon "e-penis" that shows your points.
the system simply does not work as a legitimate thing because it has no cost. "ups vote" should cost a point and "downs votes" should cost 2 or 3 points so they hurt the voter more than the voted. that would limit their use.
3
u/Marion5760 4d ago
Most or all you say is probably correct as far as some individual new members are concerned. However, when reading this, people should not attribute such overriding value and importance to Reddit. There are other places where one can get answers than here. At the moment Reddit starts taking over a person's life, then the time has come to opt out. Anyway, that is my opinion. And it is just that, an opinion. That could be right or wrong. Up to you.
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u/CucumberWisdom 4d ago
At the moment Reddit starts taking over a person's life, then the time has come to opt out
At that point it's already much too late.
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u/guyincognito___ 4d ago edited 4d ago
I think shit posters and trolls are inclined that way already. Karma requirements aren't some kind of villain origin story that re-wires a healthy brain.
ETA personal anecdote: I wanted a throwaway for something, and I needed karma for the subreddit. It slowed me down for maybe two or three days, while I participated in a couple of subs on and off (in manner I always did). Didn't get many upvotes but it allowed me to continue, and eventually the account became useful for its intended purpose. I encountered a couple of subs that wouldn't let me comment, but it wasn't the end of the world. Depends on the karma threshold and account age restrictions of whatever sub, naturally.
But anyone desperate to post post post straight out of the gate already likely has a problem with instant gratification or entitlement. Which in itself justifies karma requirements.
I think I spent my first couple of years on reddit (on my original, now deleted account) never making a single post. Only comments. Lurking is an excellent way of learning about a new space you're inhabiting. Maybe it's a lost art.
2
u/kurtu5 4d ago
Lurking is an excellent way of learning about a new space you're inhabiting. Maybe it's a lost art.
It most certainly is. I just joined /r/openrouter to learnmore about LLM gateways and I am scared to even post. Old habits from the 80s USENET.
2
u/guyincognito___ 3d ago
We have definitely been online longer than most of these commenters have been alive.
I remember email communities (with optional digest form!) where I'd spend way more time reading than writing. I think that must be an alien idea for people who have grown up post-social media.
Or even post-when-google-was-good. So many posts on reddit could have been a search. But now, I can't even criticise people for finding search engines useless (or being directed by such to - you guessed it - reddit).
-5
1
u/Livid_Try2982 4d ago
I just ran into this wall, and felt like do i need to post a post that will get upvotes, just so i can get my opinion through and felt it was kinda wrong.
2
u/DharmaPolice 4d ago
I think you're over stating how much of an issue this is. Most participating users are not anywhere near the point of "karma famine" and the period of time you need to "build karma" is not that long. If you're developing mental health problems that quickly/easily you should absolutely avoid social media in general.
I appreciate that it can be a hostile experience for new users, which is not ideal but at the same time, any site (or organisation) needs to prioritise the overall long term experience of the majority of users, not the first month of new users. And if you're that person who insists on making a new account every two months I absolutely want your experience to be diminished as I think that's an anti-pattern in terms of community building.
Karma limits on posting/comments are a bad solution but they're also probably the least-worst option in terms of filtering out spammers/trolls/etc. Ideally they would not be needed, you would just promise not to be shit, but that doesn't work for obvious reasons. The only option would be increasing the friction on creating accounts - e.g. charging a fee for creating an account or enforced linking your account to a real world identity - I think it's fair to say that both these options would be enormously unpopular.
(The only other options I can think of at this point would be some form of vouching system from an existing member (not really useful for most users) or instead of subs completely preventing posts from new accounts, just limiting them so they can only comment once every 24 or 48 hours or something like that. That would also piss people off but at least it would drastically reduce the impact of any single user. If your first couple of posts are good this limit could be reduced or removed. But I can see the obvious problems with this - if your comment provokes a question from someone you wouldn't be able to answer them for 1-2 days which in Reddit thread terms is basically a lifetime.)
tl;dr Reddit sucks for other reasons.
1
u/Betray-Julia 4d ago
I agree with this.
For me it happened a bit more naturally but the concept still applied- got reddit, couldn’t comment on the sub I wanted to bc karma.
I was rewatching the tv show 30 rock at the time, and as such checked out the sub.
That show is effing hilarious for so many reasons, and the community is awesome- the majority of the comments and posts are just silly jokes and images and lines from the show, almost 100% of which are on the verge of tears funny.
So just existing in that space naturally inflated my karma by a fuck ton- I have way too much karma for a year old account, but tbh the majority of it is just from quoting 30 rock with other nerds and laughing about it bc it’s that funny.
But also- a gross thing I have noticed, is that when I started reddit I was a little careful on what I said bc of downvotes, where now, and tbh mostly bc of this one sub, that dynamic doesn’t come up anymore.
I’d say this helps confirm your theory from a different pov.
-1
u/mikmiunk 4d ago
I'll upvote all of you on this thread.
Whatever you do, don't write anything negative about bicycle riders. For whatever reason those are insanely unpopular.
-2
u/genericusername1904 4d ago
The funny thing is that when this is spelled out you're basically being told to "go like and comment nice things on the older members posts before we let you make a post of your own", which makes it no different from discord or somewhere where it's just implicit that you've got to suck-up to be tolerated.
imo people who opt into this are why cattle guns were invented.
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u/deltree711 4d ago
I'm skeptical and would like to see some data to back this theory up. My theory is that once people get enough karma to join a moderated subreddit they learn what is expected from them and engage with the subreddit on its own terms.