What is Reddit, how does it work and what is this website for?
There are many platforms on the Internet that offer very interesting features to the user if you know how to take advantage of them. Reddit is one of them: it is a website about content published by users. Its use has spread all over the world. It is a versatile tool that you can use for many things, but first you need to know everything about how it works.
On Reddit, you will find people talking about any topic, solving other users’ doubts and making valuable contributions. This platform was launched in June 2005 by Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian, two graduates of the University of Virginia. It has hundreds of millions of monthly users. To find out what Reddit is, how it works and what this website is for, at FoxWiki we recommend that you continue reading this article.
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What is Reddit?
Reddit is a website that functions as a content aggregator and news search engine. As a user, it allows you to publish texts, videos, images and links, which can be voted by the rest of the users to make them appear in the featured posts section.
It is a community dominated by debates, questions, answers and memes, although it is difficult to summarize all the content that can be found on Reddit. The users who use this platform are mainly Anglo-Saxon, although both the website and the applications are available in Spanish.
Since its launch on June 23, 2005, Reddit has undergone many changes over the years. In 2008, it introduced subreddits and in July 2010 the Reddit Gold option. In 2015, Ellen Pao stepped down as CEO of Reddit and Steve Huffman replaced her. In September 2017, Reddit ceased to be open source. The company closed and archived access to its repositories on Github, which included the entire code written for Reddit except for the ant-spam parts. Since that time, users cannot access the full source code of the platform and cannot make modifications or improvements to the software.
Reddit changed its original look and feel in May 2018. More than 80% of users did not welcome this change. Despite the ups and downs experienced throughout its history, the platform remains popular and active for online conversation and information sharing.
What Reddit is for?
Reddit is a multifaceted website. It is a platform for sharing content with other users, be it news, questions and more. In practice, you can take advantage of it in many fields such as the following:
- Knowing trending topics: it is of great help to generate content strategies.
- Resolving doubts: there is a great multitude of subreddits that answer questions and resolve doubts. To find the answers, add the term “reddit” to your Google or Bing searches.
- Get opinions on products: Want to buy a new cell phone, or how a certain model of computer performs? Then check out Reddit to find out what other buyers think.
- Discover books or music: there are many communities dedicated to discovering books and new music.
How Reddit works
Reddit has the following functions:
- Communities: these are also known as subreddits and are spaces where posts are made on specific topics. When you access a Reddit post from Google, the community it belongs to appears at the top. The content of a community is ordered by default according to its importance, taking into account the votes received by each publication.
- Posts: in practice, these are discussions on a main topic proposed by a user. Each comment can become an independent conversation when many users reply. By clicking on “see more comments”, the nested chat will be displayed. In the posts, two elements are highlighted: the votes, which give value to the post and the comments, and the comments themselves, which are replies given by other users to the main post.
- Content you can upload: comments with text, links, images, voice recordings and polls.
- Mobile applications: there are different extensions and applications that will help you get the most out of Reddit. If you want to check the comments of your favorite subreddits from anywhere, it is best to download their official apps for iOS and Android.
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Reddit elements you need to know.
These are the fundamental elements you need to know about Reddit:
- Subreddits: these are the communities where a specific topic such as sports, books, fashion, etc. is discussed. Some are very popular and have many users and visits. On the other hand, others attract smaller but dedicated groups.
- Votes for and against the published content.
- Karma: is a reward you receive when you contribute to the community. It is based on what other users think of you. If you publish content valued by others, you receive points in favor and generate trust. You will also get karma for those comments written on others’ posts.
- Reddit Premium: in its beginnings, it was called Reddit Gold and evolved in 2018 to Reddit Premium. It is a program for users who do not want to have advertising on the portal. It also has additional options such as filtering subreddits from the main front page, as well as an option to display more comments per page, saving and bookmarking of already read comments, access to reserved subreddits, etc.
- Now that you know what Reddit is and how it works, discover the Alternatives to Twitter and What is Discord and what is it for.
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