Reddit is announcing a huge shift: It’s going to start requiring users to log in.

Right now, you can browse Reddit without having an account…

Huffman claims the login requirement is better for Reddit’s user experience and its ads business and is “more protective of Reddit data.” The “vast majority” of unauthorized Reddit access happens “through our logged-out experiences,” though the company will still strike licensing deals of its data with companies, like the deals it made with OpenAI and Google in 2024.

Source [web-archived; 2026-10-29_20-16-09Z]

Related: https://www.theverge.com/tech/1002788/old-reddit-ai-scraping (…cut back access to ‘Old Reddit’ because of AI bots…)

  • Schwim Dandy@piefed.zip
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    73
    ·
    8 days ago

    I would like to be the first to thank them for this move. It’s going to do wonderful things for the Fediverse.

    • AVincentInSpace@pawb.social
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      5 days ago

      If you mean ex-Reddit users, even if they were pissed off enough to leave Reddit (they never will be) and knew about Lemmy (they don’t), there’s no guarantee they would switch (to a normie, anything not made by a multi-million dollar company is “sketchy”)

      If you mean fewer Reddit screenshots… eh, I also don’t think that would be an improvement honestly

    • Helix 🧬@feddit.org
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      12
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      8 days ago

      Yeah maybe we get ads and investors and bots aswell! I’m glad we rely on unpaid labor to fix all this! /s

      • trojanbark@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        15
        ·
        8 days ago

        Nobody is being forced to code the platform or host an instance. Most who do it are doing it out of love or genuine interest or passion or whatever else

        • Helix 🧬@feddit.org
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          7 days ago

          Yeah, and people will burn out from this, as have countless reddit mods. All the while commercial Fediverse instances might take over.

        • Maeve@kbin.earth
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          8 days ago

          They still have real lives in the real world and their own things happening, and need sleep, relaxation, recreation, family time.

            • Maeve@kbin.earth
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              8 days ago

              I’m not suggesting it does. Lemmy will need more help, financially and “for the love,” on the influx.