Business Reddit CEO teases AI search features and paid subreddits - "We will unlock the door for new use cases, new types of subreddits that can be built that may have exclusive content or private areas, things of that nature."

The company has been eyeing new sources of revenue since going public earlier this year.​

Karissa Bell
Senior Editor
Tue, Aug 6, 2024, 6:56 PM EDT


Reddit

Reddit just wrapped up its second earnings call as a public company and CEO Steve Huffman hinted at some significant changes that could be coming to the platform. During the call, the Reddit co-founder said the company would begin testing AI-powered search results later this year.

“Later this year, we will begin testing new search result pages powered by AI to summarize and recommend content, helping users dive deeper into products, shows, games and discover new communities on Reddit,” Huffman said. He didn’t say when those tests would begin, but said it would use both first-party and third-party models.

Huffman noted that search on Reddit has “gone unchanged for a long time” but that it’s a significant opportunity to bring in new users. He also said that search could one day be a significant source of advertising revenue for the company.

Huffman hinted at other non-advertising sources of revenue as well. He suggested that the company might experiment with paywalled subreddits as it looks to monetize new features. “I think the existing, altruistic, free version of Reddit will continue to exist and grow and thrive just the way it has,” Huffman said. “But now we will unlock the door for new use cases, new types of subreddits that can be built that may have exclusive content or private areas, things of that nature.”

A Reddit spokesperson declined to elaborate on Huffman’s remarks. But it’s no secret the company has been eyeing new ways to expand its business since going public earlier this year. It’s struck multi million-dollar licensing deals with Google and OpenAI, and has blocked search engines that aren’t paying the company.

“Some players in the ecosystem have not been transparent with their use of Reddit’s content, and in those instances, we block access to protect Reddit content and user privacy,” Huffman said. “We want to know where Reddit data is going and what it's being used for, and so those are the terms of engagement.”

Source (Archive)

 

[sum ting wong]

Hopefully this is the final straw for redditors and they let the site die but I doubt it. They'll complain, private their subs for a week, and then go back to normal.

 

[JohnnyG]

Can someone confirm whether:
- reddit users are still in fact the lowest valued among all social media networks,
- trannny-jannnies receive no compensation for their hours of kvetchery and pro-Regime censorship, and
- neither the tranny-jannies nor the pRedditor users received anything of value when the company went public?

 

[Neo-Nazi Rich Evans]

Can someone confirm whether:
- reddit users are still in fact the lowest valued among all social media networks,
- trannny-jannnies receive no compensation for their hours of kvetchery and pro-Regime censorship, and
- neither the tranny-jannies nor the pRedditor users received anything of value when the company went public?

all true

 

[Haramburger]

KF has had private Supporter boards for how long? This is a new feature for reddit because...???

The snail's pace at which bare-bones websites crawl forward on features and usability is comical at this point. ONE web dev could implement this in a DAY, two if he's distracted or busy. "But will it make us money? Will it possibly harm the site? Let's run it through 500 hours of meetings, 8 tiers of management, and 4 dev teams."

 

[The Cunting Death]

KF has had private Supporter boards for how long? This is a new feature for reddit because...???

The snail's pace at which bare-bones websites crawl forward on features and usability is comical at this point. ONE web dev could implement this in a DAY, two if he's distracted or busy. "But will it make us money? Will it possibly harm the site? Let's run it through 500 hours of meetings, 8 tiers of management, and 4 dev teams."

Iirc we have like 3 private boards

TSIC
Supporters
Some Pre-Jace board thing

 

[Jimjamflimflam]

I give it two weeks before the private paid subs feature is pulled because it's a jailbait/cp trading hub

 

[Neo-Nazi Rich Evans]

I give it two weeks before the private paid subs feature is pulled because it's a jailbait/cp trading hub

nah, reddit would take far longer to pull jailbait off the site. now if it were donald trump supporters...

 

[Toji Suzuhara]

TSIC

What's that one board about?

 

[The Cunting Death]

What's that one board about?

It's a shit post board that you can access if your account is older than 6 months and you have a positive reaction score.
Stands for Top Secret Inner Circle

It's like KF's FYAD.

 

[Toji Suzuhara]

It's a shit post board that you can access if your account is older than 6 months and you have a positive reaction score.

The evafag shall sleep until his time is due, it seems

 

[Neo-Nazi Rich Evans]

It's a shit post board that you can access if your account is older than 6 months and you have a positive reaction score.
Stands for Top Secret Inner Circle

It's like KF's FYAD.

sounds like a pretty gay board. glad ive never wasted any time there.

 

[Merton J. Dingle]

At this point big tech companies are so cartoonishly evil that they're like a left-wing corpo version of the Springfield Republicans from The Simpsons — gathered in a spooky castle to discuss how they can fuck their users.

 

[Tanner Glass]

Paid subreddits and/or subreddits you can charge member fees for would be a shot across the bow for most porn sites - instead of just being an advertising place for whores with OnlyFans - they can just host the content on reddit directly.

The same could be said for communities built around Patreon/some other shit that does the same thing.

 

[WULULULULU]

Hopefully this is the final straw for redditors and they let the site die but I doubt it. They'll complain, private their subs for a week, and then go back to normal.

That implies redditors are human to begin with.

 

[Billy Hargrove]

Reddit will never be profitable.

 

[PhoBingas]

KF has had private Supporter boards for how long? This is a new feature for reddit because...???

The snail's pace at which bare-bones websites crawl forward on features and usability is comical at this point. ONE web dev could implement this in a DAY, two if he's distracted or busy. "But will it make us money? Will it possibly harm the site? Let's run it through 500 hours of meetings, 8 tiers of management, and 4 dev teams."

Something Awful paywalled damn near their whole site and beat KF to the punch by a bit. This isn't anything new, but hopefully it makes the redditors seethe.

 

[moocow]

lol they're about to be reminded just how broke and stingy most redditors are

 

[Super An Hero]

If Redditors buy faggy gold medals and applauding GIFs to put on posts that aren't theirs they'll happily buy a pass to access porn.

 

[gibbslets]

if the reddit jannies really wanted to protest they'd start publicly listing weekly data dump CSV files for their subs on a website somewhere. No moat, no power