Reddit Goes Nuclear, Removes Moderators of Subreddits That Continued To Protest

pcmag.com:

Reddit has taken a drastic step to crush the protests against the social media platform by removing entire moderator teams from several popular subreddits.

The company did so after the subreddits began allowing porn and other not safe for work (NSFW) content in an effort to keep protesting against Reddit’s controversial API change, which risk shutting down several third-party apps.  

By permitting the NSFW content, the subreddits have been trying to undermine Reddit’s ability to generate advertising revenue. That’s because ads are prohibited(Opens in a new window) from appearing in forums that allow NSFW posts. 

Hence, on Tuesday, you may have encountered a stream of nudity and other risque imagery on the platform. The starkest example has been the subreddit r/interestingasfuck, which has 11 million readers, and has already become full of porn. Other subreddits including r/pokemongo, r/Formula1 and r/videos also opened the floodgates to nudes.

But in response, Reddit has been moving swiftly to crack down on the protest tactic. The platform has removed(Opens in a new window) the entire volunteer moderator teams for the subreddits including r/interestingasfuck, r/self, r/TIHI (Thanks, I hate it), r/shittylifeprotips, and r/garmin. 

Meanwhile, Reddit pulled the entire moderator team for r/mildlyinteresting, only to backtrack on the decision, but then strip away most of their privileges, after the subreddit decided(Opens in a new window) to allow NSFW content. 

“I honestly don't even have words for this situation right now,” a moderator for r/mildyinteresting wrote(Opens in a new window) when the crackdown occurred. “No communication, no attempt to seriously answer any of our questions we asked in ModMail, but still going in