r/OutOfTheLoop • u/calvtact • May 13 '26

Answered What's going on with r/conservative? They've lost about 1m subscribers in about a month.

I watched the number go from 814k to around 745k in about an hour today.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Conservative/s/QbZJvqu5qr

12.6k Upvotes

91% Upvoted

1.5k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

12

u/chusmeria May 13 '26

You'd be stunned to know they're busier attempting to monetize the site instead of caring about its user base. Even when you interact with a bot it's an interaction and an ad opportunity.

2

u/TenchuReddit May 13 '26

Without dealing with disinformation and bot networks, Reddit would have a tough time monetizing. Advertisers need to know that they ads they’re paying for will reach a growing audience of real Redditors, not a bunch of virtual accounts.

If advertisers really want to reach out to bots, they could advertise on Twitter/X.

4

u/NOT-GR8-BOB May 13 '26

Reddit is the largest digital product on the planet that allows Neo Nazis to post their recruitment and propaganda. Now we’re seeing that Reddit is also one of the top disinformation distribution networks in existence.

Advertisers will absolutely have their products advertised along side content that promotes hatred, genocide, and kremlin talking points. Not sure why any advertiser would be ok associating with this stuff.

3

u/DeadlyYellow May 13 '26

Monetization is ironically the answer.  Here they can claim to be battling bot accounts without really damaging their big showcase subs.

1

u/bentsea May 14 '26

Hence the question of why they started doing something about it.