In comparison, the 2018 UI has far less content on screen at any given time, and uses ample whitespace for padding. Media content took up as much space as 6-7 individual posts before the redesign, similar to Facebook and Instagram. Additionally, videos autoplay as users scroll past them. This forces the user to encounter each individual piece of content for a longer period of time. The links at the top of the page have been condensed into dropdown bars to reduce visual clutter. With the new Reddit UI, it is far easier to become distracted by each post as you scroll through the site. This new UI heavily emphasizes multimedia content such as images and videos, which brought the user-experience of Reddit more in-line with Web 2.0 sensibilities.
Reddit also introduced video "shorts,", similar to the way platforms like YouTube and TikTok have embraced short-form video content, further exhibiting web 2.0 standards of user engagement. However, the controversy surrounding these changes also underscores the challenges in transitioning to a more web 2.0-oriented platform, as user feedback and adaptability are critical in this process.
The official intention behind these changes is laid out by Reddit CEO Steve Huffman in a post from 2017. He states “There are a variety of goals, but chief among them is decreasing the bounce rate of first-time visitors and increasing time on site for everyone… when those new people decide to check out Reddit for the first time they're greeted with dystopian Craigslist. We'd like to fix that.” (Pardes, 2018). The CEO explicitly prioritized increasing the time users spend on the site. Citing this metric demonstrates the importance of data aggregation and analytics to Reddit’s redesign in the era of Web 2.0 – the developers of Reddit are actively tracking and responding to their user’s bounce rates and time on the site. Furthermore, this specific objective – increasing user retention – falls in line with live-service monetization schemes such as targeted advertisements and data brokerage. This strategy reflects a distinct Web 2.0 approach to data analytics: “Real time monitoring of user behavior to see just which new features are used, and how they are used…” (O’Reilly, 2005).
Along with the redesign, Reddit rebranded their subscription service into “Reddit Premium”. In this model, paying users would be rewarded with coins that they could use to purchase rewards for posts of their choice. The addition of Reddit rewards reflects how “the collective attention of the blogosphere selects for value” in the era of Web 2.0 (O’Reilly, 2005). These rewards are displayed publicly, add visual elements to posts to make them stand out, and boost their visibility in the Reddit algorithm. This system harnesses the collective intelligence of the most dedicated users, amplifying their voices and promoting their choice of content. In a screenshot shown below, Redditors amplified the visibility of a news post by granting it hundreds of awards. The screenshot in figure (L) shows awards above the title of the post.
Reddit’s UI redesign can be clearly and directly connected to many of the principles laid out in Tim O’Reilly’s blog “What is Web 2.0”. Tim writes “The key to competitive advantage in internet applications is the extent to which users add their own data to that which you provide… Involve your users both implicitly and explicitly in adding value to your application.” (O'Reilly, 2005). Reddit engaged in this strategy by encouraging direct engagement through its revised awards system, and by expanding its total user base with lowered barriers to entry and increased aesthetic appeal. Likewise, Reddit reflected the Web 2.0 of the “perpetual beta” by slowly rolling out the UI changes to portions of their user base. Once the UI was in place, Reddit continued to make small and incremental changes to tune the user experience. These developments aligned with Tim O’Reilly’s advice to “Engage your users as real-time testers, and instrument the service so that you know how people use the new features.” (O'Reilly, 2005).