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Comment by deanCommie | Hacker News Reader

I guess this is on the frontpage because some people, in reaction to Reddit monetizing their content and ruining their experience, would prefer to burn it all down and delete all their history as a protest.

I get the wrath.

I don't get the action.

I have 15 years of history on reddit. Half of my life. It's a journal, a testament to my growth as a person. I've said brilliant things, I've said heinous ones. I see some things I'm proud of, and some I regret.

If it all goes to ashes, that's fine. The internet isn't permanent, and I lost far more on various defunct web forums from my time as a teenager. But I won't be the one to light the fire.

I didn't put those things on the internet to get rich, and if Reddit Inc. thinks they can get rich from me, that doesn't take anything away from me. They don't owe me anything, and I don't owe them anything either.

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There is a huge relief in being able to let go of everything on social media accounts. Starting fresh, deleting (at the time) my 11 year old reddit acc felt great. It was stupid of me to stick to old comments on various subreddits. Did the same to twitter recently and my online habits have felt better than ever since ditching those two sites.

It's ok to delete your content, it's your content. If you cared, you would have archived it. Same with others who might care about that content. Archiving it can mean using systems like IPFS to keep it alive as long as someone wants it. It's not some grand erasure of history, you are just throwing away old CVS receipts, err in this case Reddit receipts. It's also ok to keep those receipts if you want, filling up a cabinet in the closet maybe to look back at the time you bought a toothbrush I suppose.

Deleting accounts and histories offers a major benefit for people, which is that if they are somewhat addicted it's easier to stay away from when you no longer have an old account to feel connected to that encourages you to keep returning. This is likely the primary reason for most people, and not that they particularly care about content written.

Considering that as of 50 minutes ago, the only way to read comments is on their new interface, i'd be slightly worried about your content.

source? old.reddit still works for me

edit: but yes, if gp has 15 years of his life documented on there, and he wants to keep it, I'd suggest making an offsite backup asap.

Going to ashes is the least of your worries. It was a cool project with cool leadership. It's been People Magazine for years. What has changed is that they're getting extortionate with the way they broker access to all the data we've donated.

It's not about what they owe you or me. It's about not paywalling the commons.

Whats more, as they're pursuing monetization, all your data is more for sale than its ever been. So it's not even Reddit you'd need to trust or have rapport with. They're using your misplaced trust and extending it to anyone who wants it.

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