Image: Getty Images for TechCrunch Reddit CEO Steve Huffman has expressed regret for abusing his power by editing comments made about him on the site by Donald Trump supporters, but that's not preventing subreddit users and moderators from calling for his resignation. In an interview with The Washington Post, Huffman, who co-founded Reddit with Alexis Ohanian in 2005, admitted that changing abusive posts about him to mention the moderators of Reddit's biggest pro-Trump subreddit, r/the_donald, wasn't exactly a good idea. “I abused my power to give the bullies a hard time,” he said, adding that the name-swapping was just a joke, a matter of "trolling the trolls" for a bit. Leaked conversations One Reddit moderator, UnimatrixZeroOne, has released screengrabs of Slack conversations between Reddit moderators, admins and Huffman about the modified posts. "If he did this just because he thought it was funny, then what stops him from doing it for a more 'important' reason? "I believe I speak for all when I say that /u/spez no longer represents reddit and its interests, especially not its community. /u/spez, I am asking you to do right by the website/company you helped co-found, do right by the investors, and do right by the community. In the leaked conversations, some Reddit moderators expressed frustration with r/the_donald and asked Huffman to ban it for violating the site's guidelines. #Pizzagate Reddit was already at war with The_Donald after it shut down a subreddit dedicated to #pizzagate. The New York Times debunked the story after the owner of Comet Ping Pong, James Alefantis, and his employees started getting abusive messages and death threats on their social media accounts.
Reddit CEO Steve Huffman has expressed regret for abusing his power by editing comments made about him on the site by Donald Trump supporters, but that’s not preventing subreddit users and moderators from calling for his resignation.
In an interview with The Washington Post, Huffman, who co-founded Reddit with Alexis Ohanian in 2005, admitted that changing abusive posts about him to mention the moderators of Reddit’s biggest pro-Trump subreddit, r/the_donald, wasn’t exactly a good idea.
“I abused my power to give the bullies a hard time,” he said, adding that the name-swapping was just a joke, a matter of “trolling the trolls” for a bit.
His intention, he said, was to change mentions of his username, ‘spez’, to the moderators of r/the_donald for just a few hours and then shift it back to normal, which violates Reddit’s employee policies.
“If The_Donald had done this to another Reddit employee, I would have banned them,” he said in reference to the torrent of insults he’s been getting.
Leaked conversations
One Reddit moderator, UnimatrixZeroOne, has released screengrabs of Slack conversations between Reddit moderators, admins and Huffman about the modified posts.
He did so out of of “anger” at /u/spez for editing someone else’s comment.
“If he did this…
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