Understanding Reddit
Reddit is great social media platform for all subject matters. I use it regularly to check news on areas of interest as well as posting and commenting.
Reddit was founded in June 2005 by Alex Ohanian and Steve Huffman. Over the years it has grown to become one of the largest and most used website communities in the World.
When I first started using Reddit, I found it confusing and complicated at best.
I have written this article to try and assist either new or existing users understand the basics and get the most out of it.
In this article I will not cover all areas and only focus on ‘karma’ (the Reddit reputation system); what it is and how it affects your Reddit experience. You can view your karma at the top of the sidebar or in your profile page. Karma has no value outside of the Reddit platform and is purely an internal instrument.
Whilst some Reddit users view karma as a gimmick as dismiss it’s value, it can and does affect your reputation and ability to post and comment on the platform.
“Why was my post removed, considering my comment or post was not offensive or spam?”
If you’re karma is low, you may find that comments and posts get removed either automatically or manually by moderators. Some subreddits (communities), will only accept comments and posts from those with a minimum amount of karma.
Reddit introduced karma as a method to combat spam and bot activity. You can view it like a reputation system or a measure of your contribution to the larger Reddit community. The higher your karma, the higher your reputation and the more freedom you are allowed on the platform.
Karma is applied using a complicated algorithm that only Reddit themselves fully understand which includes many factors unknown to the the end-users. This algorithm is changed frequently to stay up to date with current trends. However, as far as we are concerned, karma is earned for both comments and posts. When one of your comments or posts is ‘up-voted’ karma is applied to your account. Equally, when your comments or posts are ‘down-voted’, you lose karma.
One thing to be aware of is ‘vote-fuzzing’. In an effort to combat bots, spammers, cheating and vote manipulation on the platform, Reddit disguises your actual score. If you monitor your karma, you may notice that the total increases or decreases by a few points. This is done to fool people using vote bots to manipulate the system. However, this is nothing to worry about as your ‘actual’ score is always recorded accurately although it may not be apparent when viewing individual posts.
There are Reddit communities dedicated to increasing karma, but I cannot endorse these. Karma should always be earned legitimately and honestly.
One tip I will give, is make sure you comment and post regularly on less ‘exclusive’ communities such as TV shows and Movies or those less restrictive like the ‘popular’ community. If you target exclusive communities such as cryptocurrency, the likely-hood of your comments and posts being removed are far greater.
In a nut-shell, build you karma up in the less exclusive/restrictive communities before moving into the exclusive/restrictive ones.
Whilst none of us have in-depth knowledge of how the system really works, here are a few tips on what you can do to help increase your karma and get your started on your Reddit journey.
Be careful with your wording. Ensure you try and limit words such as ‘sale’, ‘offer’ or anything else that can be construed as selling or spam.
Don’t get dragged into arguments and remain polite. Remember, the goal is to encourage other redditors to up-vote your comments. Getting into arguments or being disruptive could result in more down-votes than up-votes and may possibly get you banned.
Be active on popular subreddits with large numbers of subscribers. Clicking the ‘popular’ button at the top of the web page. Check the number of subscribers and currently active users, at the top-right corner of the subreddit. Frequently commenting on popular subreddits and threads is likely to get you more attention than less-busy forums.
Reply to threads on the Hot tab. You’ll find this tab near the top of Reddit when you’re signed in to your account. This tab displays the most popular threads from your subscribed subreddits. Since so many people are interacting on these threads, your comments will likely get more views and potentially more up-votes.
Comment with funny, relevant memes. The perfect meme posted on a busy thread could result in hundreds of upvotes in very little time.
Always check the subreddit rules. Many subreddits (communities) have rules which need to be adhered to. Before posting/commenting, always check the rules to ensure you do not run the risk of your posts being removed, or worse still getting banned.