If you're trying to sell knives, do you get more bang for your advertising dollar by paying some TikTok influencer to do knife-tricks with your knives, or by paying off the mods of a reddit sub that people already go to when doing research on what knives to buy? Reddit is, after all, the place people search when they don't trust the reviews on Amazon.

Reddit mods are not paid by reddit, but many of them wield considerable influence that has real economic value. There are reddit mods who are honest, but they're not likely to be in charge of a sub that can sell things or political views. Just as you should evaluate a newspaper for bias, you should evaluate reddit subs based on their potential for corruption.

Of course, there's another option now: Hire somebody to use AI spambots to drown reddit in a sea of slop singing the praises of whatever it is you're trying to sell.