Reddit will now issue warnings to users who “upvote several pieces of content banned for violating our policies” within “a certain timeframe,” starting first with violent content, the company announced on Wednesday.
“This will have no impact on the vast majority of users as most already downvote or report abusive content,” a Reddit employee says in the announcement post. In comments on the post, a user expressed concern that the new policy could make people “paranoid about voting,” but the employee says that “this would be an unacceptable side effect, which is why we want to monitor this closely and ramp it up thoughtfully.”
“We have done this in the past for quarantined communities and found that it did help to reduce exposure to bad content, so we are experimenting with this sitewide,” according to the main post. Reddit “may consider” expanding the warnings in the future to cover repeated upvotes of other kinds of actions as well as taking other types of actions in addition to warnings.
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Warning users that upvote violent content
Today we are rolling out a new (sort of) enforcement action across the site. Historically, the only person actioned for posting violating content was the user who posted the content. The Reddit ecosystem relies on engaged users to downvote bad content and report potentially violative content. This not only minimizes the distribution of the bad content, but it also ensures that the bad content is more likely to be removed. On the other hand, upvoting bad or violating content interferes with this system.
So, starting today, users who, within a certain timeframe, upvote several pieces of content banned for violating our policies will begin to receive a warning. We have done this in the past for quarantined communities and found that it did help to reduce exposure to bad content, so we are experimenting with this sitewide. This will begin with users who are upvoting violent content, but we may consider expanding this in the future. In addition, while this is currently “warn only,” we will consider adding additional actions down the road.
We know that the culture of a community is not just what gets posted, but what is engaged with. Voting comes with responsibility. This will have no impact on the vast majority of users as most already downvote or report abusive content. It is everyone’s collective responsibility to ensure that our ecosystem is healthy and that there is no tolerance for abuse on the site.
“This will have no impact on the vast majority of users as most already downvote or report abusive content,” a Reddit employee says in the announcement post. In comments on the post, a user expressed concern that the new policy could make people “paranoid about voting,” but the employee says that “this would be an unacceptable side effect, which is why we want to monitor this closely and ramp it up thoughtfully.”
“We have done this in the past for quarantined communities and found that it did help to reduce exposure to bad content, so we are experimenting with this sitewide,” according to the main post. Reddit “may consider” expanding the warnings in the future to cover repeated upvotes of other kinds of actions as well as taking other types of actions in addition to warnings.
---
Warning users that upvote violent content
Today we are rolling out a new (sort of) enforcement action across the site. Historically, the only person actioned for posting violating content was the user who posted the content. The Reddit ecosystem relies on engaged users to downvote bad content and report potentially violative content. This not only minimizes the distribution of the bad content, but it also ensures that the bad content is more likely to be removed. On the other hand, upvoting bad or violating content interferes with this system.
So, starting today, users who, within a certain timeframe, upvote several pieces of content banned for violating our policies will begin to receive a warning. We have done this in the past for quarantined communities and found that it did help to reduce exposure to bad content, so we are experimenting with this sitewide. This will begin with users who are upvoting violent content, but we may consider expanding this in the future. In addition, while this is currently “warn only,” we will consider adding additional actions down the road.
We know that the culture of a community is not just what gets posted, but what is engaged with. Voting comes with responsibility. This will have no impact on the vast majority of users as most already downvote or report abusive content. It is everyone’s collective responsibility to ensure that our ecosystem is healthy and that there is no tolerance for abuse on the site.
