Many Redditors were caught off guard by the removal of their chat and message history.

Reddit removes years of chat and message archives from users’ accounts::undefined

  • frazw@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1286·
    1 year ago

    My gut tells me they are not deleted but rather simply no longer publicly available. Can’t have these pesky AI bots training for free.

    • dhork@lemmy.worldEnglish
      82·
      1 year ago

      I think it’s the opposite. These are private chats that can’t be sold to the AI, that’s why Reddit thinks they’re worthless.

    • Radium@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      332·
      1 year ago

      More likely just moved to cold storage to save money. It’s expensive to keep data in an easily accessible database. If you don’t need to access it you can move it to object storage for pennies on the dollar and still keep it accessible for whatever nefarious data brokers you want to sell it to in the future

      • Muddybulldog@mylemmy.winEnglish
        334·
        1 year ago

        They’re implementing new chat infrastructure and only replicated 2023/01/01 forward. It’s in the article.

        • towerful@programming.devEnglish
          18·
          1 year ago

          Oh man.
          To be able to have a long running project and decide to truncate years worth of data…
          Just, drop it like you never need it again.

          Apart from working at Reddit, sounds like a dream

        • Dalinar@lemmy.nzEnglish
          12·
          1 year ago

          How much data are you storing and how much do you think reddit is?

          • Wheels@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
            5·
            1 year ago

            Right but the difference is Reddit is now charging an extortionate amount for data access via the API when compared to other platforms.
            What do you think this (if achieved what was hoped) massive new flow of income was supposed to help sustain?
            Oh yeah, infrastructure costs.

              • Wheels@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
                2·
                1 year ago

                Read about how they work.

                No need to be quite so condescending is there?
                I fully understand how they work.
                Seems like this growth they should be trying to achieve is fucking futile when they:

                • cut off the apps that a portion of their most active users use
                • prevent helpful bots (automod etc.) working correctly or being financially viable due to API changes
                • shuttered an award system that helped maintain engagement via vain dopamine acquisition and actively made them money with no replacement in sight other than some data mined financial incentive program which will lead to a lack of genuine discussion
                • spat in the face of their largely volunteer moderation community who volunteer their time for free to help keep things smooth
                • delete the content histories of their users when it isn’t publicly facing. Users give content to platform, that’s how Reddit exists, to remove DMs from users it makes it very apparent they’re content pigs and nothing more. Can’t have a transactional platform (content to profit) if the content doesn’t feel any incentive to use the platform.

                Not to mention, infrastructure costs lead to growth.
                If you don’t have the resources to support your current platform, you shouldn’t be actively trying to grow the platform by discarding older content. It makes those accessing and making use of the content (be it individual or institutional) lose trust in the quality of data.

                Great growth strategy that.

                • Rodeo@lemmy.caEnglish
                  0·
                  1 year ago

                  He means the business model they’re going for with the IPO.

                  Growth means the value of the company. The shares. The stockholders getting dividends. It has fuck all to with user experience, or even user growth. It’s about manipulating information and using clever accounting to get investors to give you money.

                  • Wheels@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
                    1·
                    1 year ago

                    The company is worth fuck all if their sole “money generation” process is via user data and authentic conversation.
                    Users ARE Reddit.
                    No content, no value.
                    No value? No dividends.

    • Muddybulldog@mylemmy.winEnglish
      9·
      1 year ago

      They’re implementing new chat infrastructure and only replicated 2023/01/01 forward. It’s in the article.

    • SpaceCowboy@lemmy.caEnglish
      51·
      1 year ago

      Probably want to prevent people from deleting their own messages. Can’t delete messages you don’t have access to anymore.

    • ultimate_question@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      100%. The idea that reddit would just permanently delete all those chat messages rather than just archive them away from the public is crazy. Even if they don’t directly sell them to advertisers there’s a shitload of value for private ML training