At least HN is a step above Reddit, right? Right?
Funny enough, I actually first read this article when someone in a deep Reddit comment thread linked to it. So yeah, so much for that.
Funny enough, I actually first read this article when someone in a deep Reddit comment thread linked to it. So yeah, so much for that.
Hacker News is Hacker News. Reddit is the communities you subscribe to. A negative view of Reddit as a whole makes no sense. The defaults and other big subreddits only reflect society at large, so any problem you have with Reddit is really with society.
/r/slatestarcodex, /r/pics, and /r/DaystromInstitute have nothing in common other than the platform.
I tend to think of "reddit" when used generally as meaning r/all for an account that isn't signed in. You won't find many "red-tribe" beliefs here, so I don't think you can say it reflects society at large. Anecdotally, I'd say the subreddit that most consistently gets something that looks a little like red tribe beliefs to the front page is r/unpopularopinion. Reddit is definitely not an even cross section of America.
Consistent Voter Tribe people don't believe me when I tell them the most popular prime time cable news program barely has enough viewers to fill a few large stadiums. What you see on /r/all reflects the interests of people who watch TV shows with tens of millions of viewers, not the minority of people extremely tuned in to politics.
This is why I stopped watching cable news and following most political media. I realized they gave me a twisted view of how popular my opinions are.