Even though the malicious compliance of this and the rest is fantastic, this is not really harming Reddit management much. It's harming through decreasing the signal to noise ratio of the data, that's for sure. However, usage of the environment shows increase. This is still serving their purpose.
That is kind of true, but you need to consider the alternative: Reddit was going to remove the mods and install some more obedient ones, so it’s basically “making the sub public” or “making the sub public but shittier”.
Furthermore, in the long run this will cause people to get bored so they’ll engage less, and either stop using Reddit or look for an alternative sub, which fragments subs even more and males Reddit shittier in general.
Reddit is trying to clean house and go public. They've proven they'll get rid of mods already so it shouldn't be about mods playing nice to avoid being replaced (there's a good chance that's going to start happening regardless sooner or later). I'd say it's better to get the point across that reddit has a shit policies, a shit CEO, and is removing mods.
I understand that you see it as obey or be removed, but it's going to another shittier alternative next time if reddit gets it's way this time.
Reddit is already spinning it as a 6% drop that lasted less than 48 hours. They don't care what a sub is doing, as long as it's active it will be helping them in the long run.
I'd love to see a mass migration away from reddit and I think the most disruption possible should be in order. A mass walkout of mods and a some spam would do much greater damage than memes.
It's obviously complicated. I still think this "meming the issue" approach is temporary, but I don't know what whill make it stop.
I do agree that the best way to say "fuck you spez" is to write it somewhere on Reddit and then leave, but I can sympathize with the mods who care depply for something they have spent so much time nurturing and shaping with zero economic benefits, who can't just let go right away. If it were me, I'd also be so pissed I'd rather destroy what I created than give it intact to someone else. Kind of toxic, but it's human behavior.
Christ, I've been using Apollo for so long that I felt personally attacked by POS spez's words even though I'm just another user of the app, I can't fathom what Christian feels right now.
We'll see in a few days/weeks what comes out of this, and how the protest will evolve. For now, I'm enjoying this giant "fuck you" people are screaming at Reddit.
The goal should be to find a way to destroy the subreddit without getting removed as mods. Which should focus on killing user engagement through draconian mod rules. Like an automod that bans everyone that comments.
People laugh at the John Oliver thing for a few days, but the joke will get stale, that's when they need to stick to their guns and keep running it into the ground. I'd also suggest limiting posts to once an hour or something like that. Mods need to focus on making Reddit boring.
Auto banning people who post is an amazing idea. I'm sure you'll get people posting just to get banned after a point but some of the most popular subs will become rule following shit posts within hours. People who love the board won't post anything because they don't want to get banned and people who don't care flood with spam, or the board just dies. But it's still open, you can still post, what's the problem? Just add a few super vague rules and cite a random one lol.