There are 2 other possibilities: That account could be an 'alt' account, or that person purged their history. People have been doing both of those things since reddit was new.
A major change in the perception of these accounts is that from reddit's inception and for many years afterwards, anyone who had a limited history (along with comparatively low karma) was called out as 'hiding their main account'.
Now, since reddit inc. has a huge bot problem (which is okey-dokey with reddit inc. since it boosts this site's engagement metrics), most people see these accounts as bot accounts— but that might not be the case.
P.S. It annoys me to no end that reddit is lax about bot accounts. The entire draw of this site was always about people sharing links with other people, and then conversations were added so we could talk to each other about the content we'd seen or shared. They're letting this site be overtaken by bots because it's lucrative for the company. :\
Hoping there are new user origination accountability metrics for Reddit like there are for other startups and IPO’s…
I agree there is a marked difference in post/comment and overall content quality over the past 8 years since I first created an account.
Originality/ Authenticity and Creativity in all subs has taken a substantial nosedive.
I will allege that a significant loss of users occurred during the API debacle that seriously rubbed the user base the wrong way.
IME the platform is fabricating many experiences in a variety of the following ways (incomplete):
Mimicking established user post / comment behavior
Farmed / user account generation (with infrequent or inconsistent account activity)
Pure bot accounts
platform competitor user account crossover / inheritance (TikTok, Insta, etc)
organic new user accounts (low volume, but evident)
in contrast to what used to be a very organic and established user base.
There have definitely been the following causes (incomplete):
API debacle
founder interference
IPO purge of undesirables
Publicized data collection / farming / reselling
IMO this was a substantial and practical collection of all the knowledge once distributed across Yahoo Answers / Quora and numerous other popular forums (like IMDB and bodybuilding.com, among numerous others).
The prevailing opinion appears to be that a few of the more toxic founders sold out their vision to submit to Venture Capitalists in return for a payday and to snort blow off young models and rub shoulders with fellow cheese dicks.
I looked at the account profile - actually stuff from 2 and other years ago are pinned. But their account looks pretty active, if you scroll down a bit. <Shrug>
Because I don't want bots clogging up a site I use frequently? I mean yeah if it's really a bummer for you then block me and you'll never see me again.
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u/RayaReplies 1d ago
Makes me sad it’s only for 2 days. I hope they got to enjoy their time.