Reddit is preparing one of the biggest changes in its 21-year history. After introducing the new For You and Following feeds, the company has announced that we’ll have to log in to access most of its content. A decision, apparently simple, that completely transforms the way we’ve browsed its communities for years, especially when we land on them out of simple curiosity.
What we’ll be able to access without an account
According to Axios, Steve Huffman, Reddit’s CEO, has confirmed that the first tests of the access restrictions will begin this quarter outside the United States. Later, the measure will be extended to the other markets. The home page and links from search engines will remain available for those of us who visit the platform without an account. At least for now.
The change, then, will affect browsing subreddits, which will be reserved for those of us signed in. It’s one more step after the restrictions on Old Reddit and the announced end of RSS. The possibility of browsing Reddit freely is replaced by much more personalized browsing.
Why Reddit wants us to log in
According to the company, this measure is meant to improve recommendations, strengthen its advertising business, and protect the platform’s information from automated systems that gather content to train AI models. Something we already saw with the changes to its API access, even if exceptions are later made for AI companies that pay for access.
Reddit’s idea is to get to know our interests better so it can offer us more precise recommendations and advertising. Add to that the experiments to turn posts into videos, it’s clear that Reddit wants to become a destination we visit directly and stay on longer. We’ll see how the community responds, because, without a doubt, there’s a big change in going from checking communities occasionally to doing so while signed in to our account.
