I nuked my Reddit accounts today. Deleted all comments and posts, then the accounts themselves. The tool I used showed each comment as it was deleted, and it was bittersweet.
I watched old gaming and movie discussions I barely remember appear and then get flagged as deleted. Communities I once participated in and then moved on as the years past flashed by. I remembered how I felt back then, and then watched them scroll on into oblivion.
Now I feel…I guess it’s grief. Sadness for that part that’s gone. Sadness that it’ll never be there again. Like footprints on a beach wiped away by the tide. It’s like it never happened. There is no trace.
And I feel anger. Mad that it came to this. Mad that I let a corporation have so much of my time and thoughts. Mad that they made it clear my life was nothing but a product to them.
It’s over now. Time for a new chapter.
Anyone else have strong feelings about losing a part of the past like this?
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I did last weekend, and 8 year old Reddit account plus my Twitter account, deleted all content I’ve ever published. I also uninstalled RiF and Twitter.
It felt weird but now it’s liberating. I just check Jerboa and Tusky from time to time and I feel that Beehaw and lgbt.tech are such open places, far from the toxicity of Reddit and Twitter.
I feel you, but I know you’ll feel better again soon! 🐝❤️
13 years account here. I’ve been postponing doing the same thing. In the last months I’ve grown opposed to Facebook, then Twitter, then finally Reddit. I’ve come to the conclusion that any form of corporate social media is harmful to individuals and communities.
Every discussion you’ve had has contributed to how you are today and that remains.
And done. Bye Musk. Bye Zuck. By Spez.
Why are they harmful? Are you saying you didn’t learn a single thing while you were there? Redditors helped me greatly. Reddit was simply the platform through which we discussed incredible ideas and life tips, and I literally found and made friendships on there that we went off Reddit for and have lasted since 2014+; I even talk to one such online friend daily, and am very focused on helping another who’s in dire straits IRL. Additionally, I learned a fair bit about CSS upfront as a mod of various small subs.
If you really think “any form of corporate social media is harmful” then I have to question how you were using it.
I can’t necessarily speak for the person you’re responding to, but I can speak to my own experience with corporate social media. Without a doubt, reddit, Twitter, Facebook, etc provided things that I value: a way to connect with people and a place to learn. But when I did it on those platforms, all of those fun chats, philosophical conversations, and learning moments that I had were owned by the social media company. I got something out of it, sure, but the corporation was skimming off the top. The recent debacles that so many social media platforms have had recently is just demonstrating that they’re getting greedier and greedier. They’re trying to extract more value from our relationships and interactions. This is pretty much how every corporate-owned social media platform is destined to end, because shareholders always demand growing profits. In the end, the only resource that social media companies can draw on to drive those growing profits is us.
You’re conflating the platform owners with their users. In case that wasn’t clear, I’m criticizing the former. There are many users doing good, but the platform owners are ultimately there to monetize the users’ attention and will mess with the way people relate to each other and to the world in the process.
Also maybe chill? I never said “I didn’t learn a single thing while I was there” and I don’t get how you “have to question how I was using it” to understand what I’m getting at.
Okay, well, it wasn’t clear to me and it sounded like you were coming down on the knowledge base of all the users just as much as the corporation that created the environment. I think we have to give credit to the company for at least building the environment in the first place for us to learn how the environment itself works, as much as our own interactions with each other. Now that we have more federated content, then down they can go, but I’m saying they have had their legitimate, positive place in the history of our online social development.
I never said “I didn’t learn a single thing while I was there”
I know; that’s why I asked if that was the case, to check. So I do not agree that “any form of corporate social media is harmful.” It’s more of a mixed bag. The bottom line is that I’m ultimately grateful for Reddit’s existence, or at least how it was at one point in time before it became eviler, and I think we all should be, and that’s why by extension I feel that anyone who just blanket-states it as horrible and annihilation-worthy (that’s what your statement sure sounded like) wasn’t going to nontoxic, edifying communities, a.k.a. didn’t figure out how to use it correctly.
To me, it’s like people pooping on ChatGPT. Yes, it has its limitations, and yes, it’s gotten many things blatantly wrong and forged literal lies. But if you know how to use it correctly and stay aware of its issues, it is life-changing. I’m not defending the atrocities of Reddit, either, but the whole picture is not as bleak as “any form” of it being harmful.
Just make sure to go back in a day or two to make sure your comments/posts stay deleted. Reddit restored all my posts/comments that I edited using Power Delete Suite is back to its original content.
Another report of deleted Reddit comments/submissions being restored: https://mastodon.social/@chris@mstdn.games/110553478094196259
I had a few posts I left up, and I found that comments from when I had previously chatted with people were still there despite having a 100% cleared comment history. So, I’m wondering if a bunch of my old comments are actually out there, even though my profile says I have none.
You post is almost a poem. It was nice to read.
If I can offer a different more positive view. You connected with other humans, and shared your experiences and love for your hobbies. Yes it happened on reddit, but it can happen again somewhere else.
I know this is quoted to death but here are some wise words from Dr. Seuss:
- Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.
went through and deleted everything I could on my profile. I don’t feel bad about it I killed all my other social media accounts years ago. Life is easier that way for sure.
unfortunately I cant seem to actually delete the account itself though. that button just results in “Something went wrong while deleting your account. Come back later and try again.” How convenient that must be for their sales data.
if anyone knows how to get around that please share
figured it out. got to go through the old.reddit.com to do this apparently.
Good to know, thank you!
I’ll be doing this for my Reddit account before the 30th rolls around and these deletion bots stop working.
Imagine all the real life conversations you have had that isn’t documented in any way and you have forgotten ever took place. People that you dont even know you’ve forgotten. That is a part of life and even if old conversations are valuable, they are not as valuable as making new ones.
It’s bittersweet to me, I love that there is new opportunities ahead and I am excited to see where technology goes from here, but there is that sadness that comes from seeing something you really loved be destroyed. I have seen things come and go so many times, I try to look on the bright side, and accept the change. No use dwelling on something you can’t personally change.
13 years here, I nuked all the comments with Redact, but today I checked my comments on reddit and I still have a few dozens, so I renuked them. I will see tomorrow if some comments reappear?
I think I’ll keep my account, but logoff from everywhere
EDIT: I think all the comments behind private sub cannot be deleted, this is why this morning the tool found new ones
Gonna do the same. Nuke all my comments and keep the account. Just change the password to something unintelligible.
Similar feelings here, but we can make new content! https://youtube.com/shorts/dN5sn37vNGs?feature=share
Personally, I always deleted and re-created accounts after a year at most. Still have my current but I’ve hardly used it since migrating.
I was going to overwrite mine after 14 years but a significant event made me hold off. My home city in the UK has been in the news for all the wrong reasons and r/nottingham is useful to keep up with events without having to trawl through the mainstream media and all the right-wing trolling that follows them. Maybe next week when I get back home and things have calmed down.
For those asking, I used redact.dev to delete my stuff. It’s available on lots of platforms including mobile.
Yeah. I’m feeling like doing the same. I did not post much, and what I did, did not gain much traction. But I think it’s time to leave that place.
