#kinker

Harley: no. Not really...

This week, I explored the wonderful and slightly scary world of Reddit. Relatively speaking, I had limited knowledge of Reddit. What I knew was that it was the ultimate social media platform where cats become celebrities (RIP Grumpy Cat) and where former semi-boyfriends of mine went to reveal their dark side (you know who you are). More importantly, a friend had their 15 seconds of fame after they made the front page of Reddit in 2015.

For this assignment, I thoroughly reviewed Reddit to understand how information is created and shared among users. Reddit considered itself to be the “front page of the internet” and supposedly the sixth most visited site in the U.S. According to research, Reddit’s user demographics were mostly young and male. Furthermore, 54% of Reddit users were from the U.S. and 45% of Americans age 25-34 are Reddit users. Users spent an average of 16 minutes on Reddit per day. In sum, Reddit was meant for a millennial audience. 

The community was divided into subreddits on different topics ranging from food, music, funny memes to advice. From my understanding, some subreddits were company/organization specific. For example, the U.S. Army had a subreddit. I am not sure if the moderators had official affilations with the U.S. Army. What I did know that was that Reddit was not listed as an official social media on the U.S. Army’s website. 

Based on reviewing different subreddits, it looked like content was organic and user-driven. It seemed like users, not company/organization representatives, were supplying and driving the content. As a result, I did not feel like I was being sold a product or message. Instead, I was letting the hopefully good-intended Redditors tell me what is important. At the time I looked at Reddit, this was the top post: 

Furthermore, I reviewed other subreddits and found this to be one of the most controversial posts at the moment: 

In sum, Reddit became the giant message board of the internet. Instead of using individual website’s message boards, people could just go to Reddit, browse different subreddits, have discussions, troll people and do whatever else they please for the true Reddit experience. While I probably will not use Reddit for professional use since I do not think it has value for my organization, I may consider using it more for personal use. My fiance and I are considering a photo of my kinked-tail cat, appropriately named Kinker, to see if any cat breed experts can tell us what breed he is: