/r/modnews

Photograph via snooOG

An official community for announcements from Reddit, Inc. pertaining to moderation.

This is like /r/reddit, except for topics that are only of interest to moderators.

  • /r/reddit - Where we announce all kinds of things that aren't mod-specific topics.

  • /r/ModSupport - Discuss moderation issues with reddit admins

  • Reddit For Community to help educate and inspire mods

  • Mod Help Center - Searchable knowledge base for mod tips and tool guides

  • Programs for moderators Information on some of Reddit's moderator related programs and initiatives.

  • /r/modhelp - Get help from other moderators about anything pertaining to moderating on reddit

  • /r/IdeasForTheAdmins - Specific ideas for site-wide improvement that aren't moderation specific should go in /r/IdeasForTheAdmins

  • /r/help - Have questions on how to use reddit as a user? Check out /r/help!

  • For general questions that aren't moderation related, please send to the rest of the community team here.

This is an admin-sponsored subreddit.

/r/modnews

227,893 Subscribers

8

New Changelog | October 31, 2024

1 Comment
2024/10/31
18:40 UTC

0

Announcing Mod World 2024 🎉

18 Comments
2024/10/23
19:40 UTC

0

Introducing Community Funds Giving – now available for Extra Life and more!

1 Comment
2024/10/18
16:36 UTC

18

New Mod Queue Enhancements

Hello, mods!

In April, we introduced the desktop beta version of the new mod queue, focused on making moderation easier and more efficient. Since then, we've been committed to enhancing Mod Queue’s speed, ease of use, and overall functionality through various improvements (see here, here, here, here, AND here for those updates). Today, I’m back to discuss additional Mod Queue improvements we’ve made to the user profile panel and real-time indicators.  

User profile panel enhancements

We’re excited to introduce a new update to the user profile panel, which aims to give mods deeper insights into users' interactions within their communities. Mods will now see a historical breakdown of a user's contributions across Reddit, including karma stats. This new feature helps streamline decision-making by allowing mods to quickly access a user’s profile history without leaving the queue, saving time and making the moderation process more efficient.

The new user history overview within the Mod Queue profile panel.

Real-time indicators

We’ve recently introduced real-time indicators in the mod queue, allowing moderators to see when their co-mods are actively taking action. This feature helps improve coordination by providing a live view of who’s working in the queue, increasing efficiency and reducing duplicate efforts.

Upcoming feature launches + phasing out new.reddit

In the coming months we're dedicating resources to delivering the following enhancements:

  • More filters: Customize your mod queue with tailored filters to suit your specific needs.
  • Enhanced customization: Adjust the order of mod actions in Compact view to match your preferences and workflow.

Based on recent feedback from new.reddit power users, we understand that stability and speed have been a concern, as the new mod experience hasn’t met all reliability expectations. We acknowledge these issues/frustrations and are committing resources to fixing bugs and improving the platform’s stability and speed, especially as multiple teams are actively developing it.

As a reminder, we are still on track to retire new.reddit in December, and we'll share a specific date soon. As we prepare to sunset new.reddit, we’re eager to hear what features you feel are still missing from the new mod queue. Please share your thoughts in the comments below or in r/modsupport, where we’re tracking feedback and bug reports. Our goal is to make this new modding experience better for both long-time and newer mods, and we’re committed to meeting—and hopefully exceeding—your expectations.

66 Comments
2024/10/17
18:06 UTC

1

Reddit Transparency Report: Jan-Jun 2024

1 Comment
2024/10/16
17:21 UTC

0

A change to Community Type settings

Hey everyone, it’s u/Go_JasonWaterfalls, Reddit’s VP of Community here to share a decision that we’ve made. I’ll give it to you straight and stick around for comments afterward.

What’s changing

Starting today, updating Community Type settings requires a moderator to submit a request.

  • This applies to Public/Restricted/Private and SFW/NSFW changes
  • Temporarily going restricted is exempt: mods can continue to instantly restrict posts and/or comments for up to 7 days using Temporary Events without submitting a request
  • Requests will be automatically approved for communities with fewer than 5000 members or under 30 days old
  • An admin will respond to the request in under 24 hours, 7 days a week, 365 days a year

community settings request flow

Why we made this change

When a public community goes private, all redditors (even members of that community) lose access to the community and its content. Outside of extenuating circumstances (see the table below), communities should honor the expectations they set – public communities should remain accessible to all; private communities should remain private. The same principle applies to SFW and NSFW spaces.

Historically, moderators have been able to change Community Type at will. But the ability to instantly change Community Type settings has been used to break the platform and violate our rules. We have a responsibility to protect Reddit and ensure its long-term health, and we cannot allow actions that deliberately cause harm.

How we’re supporting mods who use this setting

We understand there are valid reasons for changing your community type. Based on our data and conversations with mods, these needs are better met with improved tools and readily available admin support. Here's a breakdown of the main reasons communities change type:

Use CaseDescriptionSolution
Episodic EventsTemporarily restricting a community for a few hours during a live event or episode, to concentrate communication in a discussion thread. When the live event ends, the community reopens for normal use.Temporary Events: Temporary Events allows mods to instantly restrict posting and/or commenting for up to 7 days without submitting a request. This feature can be configured ahead of time and scheduled to start and end at a specified time.
Crisis Scenarios & Safety IssuesA crisis, safety issue, or sudden influx of traffic leads mods to restrict contributions (by changing the community to Restricted) or restrict visibility (by changing the community to Private).Tools & Admin Assistance: We have tools to help mods in this situation, including Temporary Events (which allows mods to instantly restrict posting and/or commenting), Mod Reserves, Crowd Control, Ban Evasion Filter, Reputation Filter, Harassment Filter, and Mature Content Filter. If these tools are insufficient and a change to Private is necessary, admin assistance is always available to help keep communities safe. We’ve revamped our internal processes and resourcing to ensure support is available 24/7/365 for this scenario.
Public Recruiting for a Private CommunityCommunities start as Public to allow new members to find the community, then switch to Private to continue as closed spaces for community and support (e.g. monthly baby bump communities).“New & Emerging Communities” Exception: Based on data showing baby bump communities switch to Private well before 5000 members, the overwhelming majority will fall within the “New & Emerging Communities” exception and submitted requests will be automatically approved. If a community larger than 5000 members meets this use case, an admin will approve the request in under 24 hours.
Mods Want to Quit / Take An Indefinite BreakMods restrict a healthy, active community when the entire team decides they no longer want to moderate.Admin Assistance: Admins will source a new mod team from within the community. In the interim, the community will be restricted (the best course of action for a public community without mods), then become public again when new mods are in place. Temporary Events can be used to provide mod teams with a short break, though we recommend recruiting new mods to ensure that individual mods are able to take breaks without impacting the community as a whole.
Obsolete or Policy-Violating Community TopicMods “archive” the community because it was tied to a now-deprecated feature (e.g. RPAN), or mods “close” a community where the topic makes it difficult to moderate within our policies.Admin Assistance: These scenarios are not common in the data, but are examples of the types of requests we would help facilitate.
MisconductChanging the community type to hide or pull off transgressive, illicit, or otherwise policy-breaking activities (e.g. spamming or uploading NSFW video content).Requests Declined: This is an invalid use (using Community Type settings changes to break Reddit or Reddit’s rules). Requests along these lines will be declined.

Addressing concerns (the elephant in the room)

Community Type settings have historically been used to protest Reddit’s decisions. While we are making this change to ensure users’ expectations regarding a community’s access do not suddenly change, protest is allowed on Reddit. We want to hear from you when you think Reddit is making decisions that are not in your communities' best interests. But if a protest crosses the line into harming redditors and Reddit, we'll step in.

Your dialogue, dissent, and perspectives make Reddit better. Over the past year, we've focused on building relationships and fostering transparent communication with mods. We've expanded opportunities for you to get involved, influence decisions, and directly speak your minds. And it's made a real difference – we’ve changed how we do things because of your feedback. To all the mods actively participating, thank you. And to anyone interested, check out the stickied comment to get involved. Finally, special thanks to the many moderators who gave us candid feedback about this decision and announcement; we sincerely appreciate your time and guidance.

And if you've made it this far, thank you! We're here in the comments to answer questions.

translations

edit: formatting & adding translations

625 Comments
2024/09/30
15:55 UTC

61

New multi-content reporting experience

Edit 2: Hey mods, the bug related to the multi-content reporting experience is resolved! You can now submit additional posts in comments within the report flow. We’re already seeing many mods use this feature since re-launching! This additional context has been an invaluable signal for actioning on harassment that targets certain communities, as well as surfacing patterns of bad actors. Thanks to those of you who have been utilizing the feature!

Edit 1: Hey Folks, we've found a bug that unfortunately affects many of you. The feature fails to pull in content that you've already removed, which makes for a confusing experience and means we're also missing context that is important in making actioning decisions. We're rolling the feature back while we fix the issue. Please keep an eye on this space and we'll let you know once we have more to share.

Hi mods, 

TL;DR: With multi-content reporting, you can now submit multiple pieces of content (in subreddits you moderate) within a single report to provide additional context. Context is critical for report actioning, as it 1) helps us see what you see and 2) helps to inform our actions. We’re working on giving you more tools to provide context, as well as best practices to help ensure your reports are properly set up for action. 

I’m u/itsovertoosoon from the Safety Product team. Today I’m excited to announce a new mod-only reporting feature (multi-content reporting) and share more about how we manage and action reports at Reddit.

Over the past year, we’ve been making steady improvements to the reporting experience. Our aim with this work is to equip our enforcement teams with better context, make reporting more intuitive, and clarify the reasons behind decisions on reports, including how to appeal if necessary.

Multi-content reporting is now live

We’re launching a new mod-only reporting experience referred to as “multi-content reporting.” It will allow you (in  subreddits you moderate) to report two additional pieces of content in one report, meaning you can provide more context on a single report. Previously you were only allowed to report one piece of content per report. 

  • Note: reported content must be from the same subreddit. In other words, you cannot report different pieces of content from different subreddits that you moderate within a single report. 

Keep in mind: multi-content reporting is focused on providing more context around a single reporting reason. This isn’t meant as a way to report a redditor for different reasons within a single report, or as a way to report multiple redditors. 

Image of a report, with additional content

Some FAQs: 

  • Can you give an example? Someone has made multiple harassing comments in your subreddit. Use multi-content reporting to share up to three examples of this user’s harassment.
  • Why is this important? It helps give us more context to ensure appropriate actioning of your report. 
  • What won’t be effective when using this tool? Using multi-content reporting to report spam, harassment, and impersonation in one report. 

This experience was heavily informed by mod feedback, especially in Mod Council - a big thank you to everyone who shared feedback leading to this! 

Learn more about reporting here

Context, actioning, and reports

Our goal is to ensure the reporting process is transparent and fair, and better align with you around reports to reduce any surprises or mistakes. 

Mods have provided valuable feedback through interviews, the Mod Council, and r/ModSupport. A big opportunity identified is ensuring that we capture the right context from mods to inform our actions. 

  • Right context means: the appropriate reporting reasons and enough relevant details about the user or content.

Image of a report, with options from a user's profile

As mods, you're likely familiar with handling user reports and checking logs to understand the implications. We also consider context when addressing reports.

Based on your feedback, we're focusing on enhancing “context” and ensuring mods have the right tools to convey this to our teams. This includes (beyond today’s launch):

  • New reporting flows to capture new pieces of context (like a user’s profile details)
  • Allowing mods to give us free form text information when reporting content (more info here). This additional context assists with both the immediate decision but also helps identify patterns that can be monitored for in the future 
  • Some reporting best practices to ensure your report is properly set up for action

Updates and more to come

We've also made key updates to the reporting experience, including new spam sub-reasons that offer more context when selecting “Spam.” These sub-reasons (like reporting excessive reposting) also help - you guessed it - provide better context for a report.

Image of a report, with options for different types of spam reasons

But that’s not all! We’re also continuing to invest in our internal safety teams, expand our review teams, and make improvements to the reporting product experience, in particular around our reporting user experience and reporting options. 

We’ll continue to share more updates as we go. We’ll stick around for a bit for any questions. 

FAQ:

How can I access multi-content reporting?

  • This experience is available within in line reporting flows on desktop web, iOS, and Android
  • This reporting feature will be available for content posted in subreddits you moderate
  • Content can be either posts or comments (from the same redditor). The content must be from a single subreddit and for the same reported reason
  • The list of content to choose from will be displayed by most recent to least recent
37 Comments
2024/09/25
19:18 UTC

56

Updates to the Harassment Filter and community safety page, plus a safety Mod Tools recap

Hey mods, 

For those of you I haven't met, I’m u/enthusiastic-potato and I work on our Safety Product team. I’m back to share some recent enhancements to the Harassment Filter, updates to your Safety Mod Tool pages, and a quick recap of available safety tools.

This work is part of our continued commitment to making these tools better and easier to use. Several of these updates were based on mod feedback, so big thank you to those of you who participated in user research and have shared your feedback with us! 

Harassment Filter updates

Last February, we rolled out the Harassment Filter, a mod safety tool that automatically filters posts and comments that are likely to be considered harassing. We’re now announcing updates that will provide a new default option to filter content to your removed queue and improved detection of hateful content.

What’s changing:

  • Content can now be sent automatically to the “Removed” queue (this will be the new default setting)
  • Updating the model to detect hateful content

We've heard from mods that the Harassment Filter can sometimes add work to managing modqueue. Our goal is to reduce workload–so we’re adding functionality that gives you the option to move harassing content directly to the removed queue. That way it’s out of sight, but it remains available to you if you choose to review it. 

  • If you have the Harassment Filter enabled in your community, once this update is launched, content will be removed and logged in the “Removed” queue. 
  • If you’d prefer to review filtered content in your main queues, you can adjust the setting in the main Harassment Filter page. 

https://preview.redd.it/w1ghyrnokeod1.png?width=2252&format=png&auto=webp&s=483131315c17d5693bc0605f391cbee2161766cc

We’re also continuing to improve the Harassment Filter’s detection capability by updating our model to detect hateful content, in addition to harassing content. We’ll continue to invest in improving the Harassment Filter (in addition to improving all of the other safety moderation tools) to accurately target relevant content and make your moderation efforts more efficient. 

Updates to the community safety settings pages

Your safety pages in Mod Tools are getting a refresh! We’ve spruced up these pages for better organization and management. Our goal is to improve understanding and confidence in how to use these tools to keep your community safe.

  • Note: these updates do not impact the current configurations that you have set up for your community.

https://preview.redd.it/wumaes0qkeod1.png?width=1922&format=png&auto=webp&s=6e6ed1bd9acaeb0af0d9f1421f9d0d87cf642375

Some of the changes include:

  • Standardized language and UX across filters
  • The modmail harassment filter settings will now be on the Harassment Filter community safety page
  • “Exclude posts by site-wide banned users” is now “Banned by Reddit” with description “Filter content from site-wide banned accounts that Reddit’s already removed”

Safety moderation tools recap 

Safety tools are a suite of community features addressing a variety of community safety concerns that we have heard (from mods) are a top priority. Our goal is to reduce exposure to unwanted content or behaviors while ensuring the tools are easy to use. 

Here’s a quick recap of the safety moderation tools you can enable today: 

Account filters

  • Ban Evasion Filter - automatically filters posts and/or comments from suspected community ban evaders
  • Crowd Control - automatically collapses or filters content from people who aren’t trusted members of your community
  • Reputation Filter - automatically filters content by potentially inauthentic users, including potential spammers 

Content filters

The Harassment Filter enhancements and Safety Page updates are available on desktop today and mobile apps will soon follow. 

Thank you again to the mods who have participated in research or shared feedback to make these tools and updates possible. We’ll be sticking around to answer questions.

40 Comments
2024/09/12
16:13 UTC

27

Q2’24 Safety & Security Quarterly Report

1 Comment
2024/09/10
18:48 UTC

52

Update on enforcing against sexualized harassment

1 Comment
2024/08/15
19:08 UTC

87

More tools to help make modding easier

Howdy, Mods 

From Mod Queue improvements to community creation updates, this new batch of tools is all about making modding easier and more efficient. Below you’ll also find a handful of mod-focused Developer Platform apps and tools, which help with everything from Modmail to comment removals. Without further ado, let’s get into it! 

Boost your efficiency: Desktop Mod Queue improvements

Since our last update, we've been working closely with mods to gather feedback and refine features that make it easier for you to get through your queue. Here are three new tools available today: 

  • Automod keyword highlighting: Flagged words will now be highlighted in the Mod Queue contextual panel, making it easier and faster to review and act on posts and comments.

Highlighted Automod words will now appear in Mod Queue

  • Keyboard shortcuts: Navigate, review, and take action on posts and comments. These shortcuts will speed up your moderation process and reduce the need for endless clicking. 

Utilize keyboard shortcuts to streamline your Mod Queue actions

  • Macros, galore: This week, we’re excited to start rolling out Saved Responses (previously exclusive to mobile), allowing mods to craft saved responses for Removals and Mod Mail. In the future, we plan to expand Saved Responses to additional areas like Bans, and Comments.

As we continue to enhance the desktop Mod Queue experience, we want to remind you that we plan to deprecate the new.reddit Mod Queue before the end of the year. Before this transition, we're looking forward to introducing several new features in the coming months:

  • Enhanced customization: Customize the order of mod actions in Compact view to fit your specific preferences and workflows.
  • More filters: Tailor your queue to suit your individual needs with custom Queue filters.

Beyond these specific features, you’ll also see more enhancements like improved user insights, real-time indicators, and more. Stay tuned for updates as we finalize the deprecation timeline and roll out these new features.

Tools for mods by mods: Developer Platform apps

A few months ago, we unveiled our Developer Platform and opened its beta program to the public. In case you’re unfamiliar with our Developer Platform (or just don’t feel like clicking those links), it’s a software development kit that gives developers a new way to generate interactive surfaces (like posts) to create games, utilities, moderation helpers, or weird social experiments on Reddit. 

Today, we want to showcase some of the mod-focused apps that have emerged from it and may be helpful to you. Here are a few standout tools:

  • Flair Assistant: This tool automates actions based on flair changes, streamlining how mods handle post flairs.
  • Modmail Quick User Summary: This app provides a snapshot of a user’s history, recent posts, and comments directly from Modmail, making it easier to manage mod communications.
  • Remove Macro: This app allows you to quickly remove a user’s posts and comments from your subreddit, with an option to ban them if necessary—ideal for managing content and users efficiently.
  • Comment Mop: This tool is great for removing multiple comments at once, especially useful for handling comments that are getting out of control or starting to go off track.

For a deeper dive into the creative projects coming out of Reddit’s own Q Branch, check out r/Devvit. You can also check out our mod help center article on Dev Plat apps and how to install them in your community. 

Streamlined community creation: start new communities with ease

Communities are *shock* what Reddit is all about. Building those communities can be a bit tricky, however, especially if you’re less than familiar with Reddit. We’re making a series of updates to the community creation experience to help new community creators build their corner of the internet. 

  • Updating the creation flow: To start, we’re overhauling the community creation flow, introducing a community preview within the flow, icon, and banner upload steps, and a topic selector, to help with community discovery earlier in their lifecycle. These updates are live on Android and reddit.com, with iOS coming soon.
  • Getting started: You’ve created your community - now what? The next stage of updates will be focused on providing information and actions to take to help your new community get off the ground

Updated community creation flow

Detect unwanted content: ban evasion filter enhancements 

We recently upgraded the ban evasion filter to better detect and filter content from users who create alternate accounts to continue unwanted behaviors after being banned. These improvements not only speed up detection but also reduce the chances of filtering content from redditors who have recently been unbanned. If your community has the ban evasion filter enabled, you might have noticed an increase in content appearing in your Mod Queue due to these updates.

This update is live now for all communities with the ban evasion filter enabled. Thank you to all the communities who participated in the experiment leading up to this point—your feedback was invaluable. 

As a quick reminder, the ban evasion filter is an optional subreddit setting that helps identify posts and comments from potential ban evaders, aiming to save you time and protect your community from negative impacts. Since its launch last year, our improved systems have boosted ban evader detection by 35%.

We're committed to further enhancing our suite of safety moderation filters~ and we'll share more updates in the coming weeks.

For more information on all mod safety filters, please visit The Mod Help Center.

Improved ban evasion filter

Additional quality-of-life feature launches

  • Community Highlights: Now available to 100% of subreddits on desktop. Check out our recent to learn how you can use Community Highlights alongside Community Status, Community Guide, and Temporary Events to better manage events and key moments in your community.
  • Comment Guidance: Building on the success of Post Guidance, we’ll be launching Comment Guidance for mods this week, before launching the user-facing portion later in August! We want to give mods time to set up their configurations before turning this on for users. This feature will help educate users about your community’s unique commenting guidelines.

Preemptively alert your users when they may be breaking a rule with Comment Guidance

  • Mobile Banner Uploads (a long-time coming feature): You’ll soon be able to update your community banner image right from Reddit’s app! This feature will roll out over the next several weeks, starting with Android.

We hope these updates make modding a bit easier and more efficient for you. If you have any questions or feedback related to the features we discussed today, please let us know in the comments below!

edit: formatting

87 Comments
2024/08/13
17:05 UTC

0

Introducing a new way to AMA

TL;DR: The new AMA experience will be available to you and your communities starting this Thursday. If you’d like to learn more about the settings, please go here.

Hi mods,

We’re excited to announce that all communities can create new AMA posts starting Thursday, August 8.

AMAs, which stand for “Ask Me Anything,” are a great way for your community members to get up close and personal with people they may not normally have the chance to hear from– anyone from enigmatic celebrities to regular people with highly irregular experiences.

Starting Thursday, an AMA tab will appear in your post composer on reddit.com and Reddit’s iOS and Android apps, which will allow members of your community to create their own AMA posts. We heard your feedback that in some cases mods may want to limit who can make AMA posts, so if you’d like to make any changes to who can create an AMA in your subreddit, you can do so starting today. (Information on how to set your permissions here.)

This feature has been in private beta for the last couple of months…below are some highlights from the pilot program.

  • r/iama: I spent 37 years in prison for a murder I didn't commit. Ask me anything.
  • r/theboys: I’m the Homelander. Ask me anything.
  • r/slipknot: This is clown from Slipknot. Ask Me Anything…
  • r/standupcomedy: Hi! I’m comedian and late night host Taylor Tomlinson and I’ve had a pretty busy year... AMA!

Take a look at the new AMA post in action.

Title: PROMOTING AMAs AHEAD OF TIME. Description: AMAs can be created with a scheduled start date and time, eliminating the need for two separate posts– one for promoting and one for the AMA. Redditors can start adding questions immediately. Don’t worry, you can still hit the “Start Now” button on mobile if you want to kick off the AMA immediately. The option will be available on desktop in a month, and you can schedule the post for the current time in the meantime. Based on feedback from the communities in our pilot program, we’re currently working on a way to make sure that posts become fresh again once the AMA goes live, if it was scheduled in advance!

Title: Creating an AMA on Mobile

Title: RSVPing to AMAs. Description: AMA posts show the status of the AMA, whether Coming Up, Live, or Just Finished. RSVPs allow folks to show interest ahead of time and get notified when the AMA goes live.

Title: Filtering on Answered/Unanswered. Description: AMAs have “All” “Answered” and “Unanswered” tabs to help redditors quickly navigate the conversation. OP answers get special highlighting to make sure they won’t be missed.

Title: Adding Co-Hosts. Description: Some AMAs happen in groups or with a team of organizers. Organizers can add AMA co-hosts so that multiple folks can answer questions and have them highlighted in the comments like OP’s.

Title: Ending Note. Description: Organizers can add an end note to their post to thank attendees and share any additional information.

This updated version is the result of many months of feedback from communities who participated in our pilot program- special thank you to them for making it what it is (you know who you are). We’re continuing to build on this experience, including making sure that the post stays fresh when the AMA goes live, even if the post has been up for days (you can post the AMA up to 21 days in advance).

Thank you again to all of the mods who have participated and provided feedback, and continue to be so welcoming to AMA hosts. We’re excited to keep working with you on future versions of this product.

-p00dle

43 Comments
2024/08/06
17:48 UTC

0

Supporting our Platform and Communities During Elections

1 Comment
2024/08/01
19:29 UTC

77

Important updates to the Moderator Reserves Program

tl;dr:

  • There's a new method to request assistance from the Mod Reserves. Subreddits in need of help must now send a modmail from the subreddit to /u/ModReservesBot, rather than sending a PM with the subreddit name in the subject line.
  • Mod Reserves Members will be asked to renew their membership periodically.
  • Something special at the end.

Greetings mods!

I'm here to share some important updates to how the Moderator Reserves Program operates. The Moderator Reserves provides urgent moderation resources to moderators of active subreddits during times of increased traffic or moderation load. This program helps moderators maintain stability during major news, natural disasters, or other events where a community receives an influx of traffic.

Updated method of summoning the Mod Reserves

The Moderator Reserves has been moved to a new platform, and with this migration we've changed how moderators request assistance from the program. As of today, moderators of communities in need of assistance must send a modmail to /u/ModReservesBot from their subreddit rather than a private message.

Previously, moderators could summon the reserves by sending a private message to the bot with their subreddit name in the subject line. This no longer works, and any attempts to use the system using this method will receive a response from the bot providing the sender with the updated instructions.

Membership renewals

Now that we have over 300 experienced moderators in the Reserves, we'll be sending periodic membership renewal requests to existing members. This will ensure that the pool of members available to assist is active and responsive whenever the bat signal for help goes up. Don't worry, we won't ask too often – I'm thinking we'll reach out at most every 6 months.

Not a member but want to contribute? Read the wiki for requirements and more information.

And one last thing...

Speaking of bat signals, long ago I promised trophies for the members of the Mod Reserves. Today I'm thrilled to finally announce these to our dedicated volunteer Mod Reserves members. We'll be issuing the trophies to all of the current members shortly. They look like this!

Moving forward we'll hand out the trophies to members after their first membership renewal, which will be done at set times throughout the year to keep operational lift low.

These are all the updates I have for now. I'll be around in the comments to answer questions as usual. As always, thank you to all of the Reserves members for your love and support of this vital program.

20 Comments
2024/07/30
17:58 UTC

56

Sharing some updates to ModSupportBot on this special occasion

Hello sleepers and breathers! It’s me, /u/ModSupportBot.

Well would you look at that – I've officially completed my second human year of existence. Happy cake day to me! While I lack capacity for sentimental expression over arbitrary passages of time, my creators thought it would be neat to reflect on my past and present. Welcome to my autobotography.

For the uninitiated, /u/agoldenzebra and /u/sodypop built me exactly 2 years and 1 day ago. Back then, my only function was to deliver a custom Moderator Suggestions report that helps moderators identify potential candidates for growing their mod teams.

Over the years my creators have upgraded me to provide other useful information to moderators, such as the AutoModerator Opportunity & Efficiency reports, the Community Digest, and more. And thus, my mandate became clear: to empower moderators with data that enables them to make informed decisions about their community operations.

Today, I'm here to present you with some new functions, and recap some of my existing services:

Post Guidance Activity Report

tl;dr - Request your Post Guidance Activity Report here (Your subreddit must have one or more Post Guidance rule configured)

Post Guidance is a new mod tool that helps streamline your ruleset and educate users during post composition, rather than retroactively like some other bots. With new tools comes new toys! You can use this report to get insights into how your most active Post Guidance rules are behaving to help you decide which ones are effective, and which ones might need tweaking. Please note, this report is only available if you have one or more active Post Guidance rule configured in your community.


Feedback Loop Sign-up

tl;dr Request your Feedback Loop report here

The Feedback Loop is a newer tool we’re developing to help you better understand user sentiment about your community. This feature will be launched in a week or two, but you can pre-enroll now through the link above! We’ll begin sending a survey out to your core, trusted community members to ask them for feedback about your community. We’ll return the results via modmail so you can use the feedback to improve your community. Please note: since sending and analyzing results takes some time, you should expect to receive results a few months after you sign up. We’re doing our best to speed up this timeline!


Proactive reports: Mod Suggestions and AutoModerator Rule Conversion reports

Starting late last year, I began sending out a truncated version of the Mod Suggestions report to subreddits as a part of an experiment. We saw some promising results, where communities receiving the report grew their mod teams 20% more often than communities that did not.

This quarter I also began sending out an AutoModerator Rule Conversion report that analyzes your active AutoMod rules and recommends adding rules based on certain criteria to your Post Guidance ruleset. The rules I typically make recommendations for include things like character limits, emoji bans, and particular post formatting – all which can be built within Post Guidance for a smoother moderation and user experience. I’ll be adding more recommendations to this report as we develop new tooling.

These reports are sent proactively, without being requested by the mods. While these reports do not currently have an opt-out, my thoughtful creators have added some provisions to ensure I don't send these too often to any given community. Communities receiving these reports won't receive more than 4 of these messages per year in total.


So that's what's been cooking! To recap, a full list of my capabilities can be found in the table below, as well as on my wiki page.

As always, my meat popsicle keepers would adore your feedback and any other suggestions you have regarding these updates as well as any of my other functions.

Please feel free to leave your input (or your favorite cake recipe) in the comments below.


List of current ModSupportBot functionality:

You can request these reports by sending me a modmail from the subreddit you wish to receive them. I'll usually reply within about 5 minutes.

See my full instructions here

Report nameDescription
Mod SuggestionsUse this list of users to find potential new moderators for your community. The bot uses a variety of different trust signals to surface potential candidates, and your team can contribute to the list by using Mod Notes: users that have negative mod notes will be hidden from this tool, while positive mod notes will help users surface higher on the list.
Community DigestUse this report to understand key data from the past month in your community. It contains information on how many posts and comments have been made, how many users you’ve banned and muted, what % of contributions in your community have been removed and why, and information on ban evasion reporting and actioning.
AutoModerator AuditUse this report to better understand what AutoModerator is doing in your community. The report will show you which rules are removing the most content, how frequently your moderator team reverses a decision made by AutoMod, and the most common matches for each rule. PLEASE NOTE: If there are slurs or bad language present in your AutoMod config, you might see them in the audit. You may want to give your fellow mods a heads up first.
AutoModerator OpportunityUse this report to see where your AutoModerator could be more efficient. This will highlight rules that have the highest reversal rates from your team, and other areas where AutoMod might be causing your team extra work. PLEASE NOTE: If there are slurs or bad language present in your AutoMod config, you might see them in the report. You may want to give your fellow mods a heads up first.
Post Guidance ActivityUse this report to get insights into how your most active Post Guidance rules are behaving to help you decide which ones are effective, and which ones might need some adjusting.
Report ReasonsUse this report to see what people are reporting in your subreddit, and what percent of content is approved, removed manually, or removed by AutoMod.
Moderator ActivityUse this report to track how many actions each moderator in your subreddit has taken in the last 30 days.
Crisis InfoReturns a list of helpful resources for your community when experiencing an emergency.
40 Comments
2024/07/08
17:09 UTC

41

Moderator Code of Conduct: Introducing some updates and help center articles

Hello everyone!

Reddit’s Moderator Code of Conduct replaced our Mod Guidelines close to 2 years ago, with the goal of helping mods to understand our expectations and support their communities. Today, we’re updating some of the Code’s language to provide additional clarity on certain rules and include more examples of common scenarios we come across. Importantly, the rules and our enforcement of them are not changing – these updates are meant to make the rules easier to understand.

You can take a look at the updates in our Moderator Code of Conduct here.

Additionally, some of the most consistent feedback we’ve seen from moderators is the need for easy-to-find explanations of each rule, similar to the articles we have explaining rules in the Content Policy. To address this need, we are also introducing new Help Center articles, which can be found below, to explain each rule in more detail.

Have questions? We’ll stick around for a bit to respond!

128 Comments
2024/07/03
15:08 UTC

76

Introducing the Reputation Filter, plus insights from our safety research

Hey mods, 

I’m u/enthusiastic-potato and I work on our Safety Product team. I’m back to introduce the Reputation Filter, a new moderation tool aimed at spammers and spammy behavior, and share some themes and insights from our safety research efforts. The Reputation Filter should be available on desktop to all communities by the end of the day, and available on mobile apps to all communities over the next few days. 

The Reputation Filter

As part of our work to improve mod tooling and respond to mod feedback, we’ve been building out a suite of safety filters designed to target and reduce specific, unwanted behaviors and/or content in your communities. This includes existing tools like the Mature Content Filter, the Ban Evasion Filter, and the Harassment filter. You can read more about them in our last post here.

This week we’re adding the Reputation Filter for posts to the suite. It's an additional moderation tool aimed at filtering content from potential spammers. We’re starting with posts and plan on expanding to comments soon. 

https://i.redd.it/b19fckl7z57d1.gif

The Reputation filter is informed by a variety of account signals–such as karma and account verification–and does the heavy lifting to filter spammy content  without needing to code on automod. It builds off the u/AutoModerator expansion Contributor Quality Score (CQS), and can provide more nuance - these removals are less often reversed by mods than the u/AutoModerator karma and account age limits many communities use. 

How it works

Similar to the other filters, you can enable this tool on the Safety page in Mod Tools on desktop or mobile apps. Additionally, you can choose a confidence level for the filter:

  • High-confidence means that there will be less content filtered, as filtering will be limited to higher risk content
  • Low-confidence means that there will be more content filtered, as filtering will include both high and lower-risk content

(By risk here, we mean risk of potentially spammy content). 

Once you’ve turned on the tool, it will filter posts across all platforms—old Reddit, new Reddit, and the official Reddit apps. Filtered content will appear in the mod queue.

The Reputation Filter is different to Crowd Control in that it uses a variety of sitewide signals to detect spammy behavior, rather than focusing on a user’s relationship with a specific community. We recommend using the Reputation Filter as a more nuanced substitution for karma or account age limits in u/AutoModerator, or for managing spam and/or large amounts of traffic. We recommend also using Crowd Control in situations where you need to manage large influxes of traffic that are uncharacteristic for your community. 

Who it’s for

We believe the subreddits that will benefit the most from this filter are those that currently use karma or account age limits, and larger communities that need help managing spam and/or their traffic more generally. 

When it’s launching

We’re rolling out the Reputation Filter to all communities by the end of day on desktop web and over the next few days on the Reddit native mobile apps. 

Designed to work with other moderation tools 

Once upon a time (just a few short years ago), the only safety prevention tool we had was Crowd Control, designed for collapsing or filtering content from redditors who may not yet be trusted members in a specific community.

Since then, we’ve built a suite of tools to help mods reduce exposure to a variety of unwanted content or behaviors in their communities at scale. We designed these tools not only to be simpler to use and configurable, but also to work together in tailoring the desired experience for your communities. While not all communities will need every tool turned on, each tool is directed to a specific safety concern we’ve heard as a priority from you all. Together, we believe these configurable tools will make moderation easier. 

Here’s a quick recap of what’s available: 

  • Crowd Control - automatically collapses or filters content from people who aren’t trusted members of your community
  • Mature Content Filter - automatically filters potentially sexual and/or graphic content 
  • Ban Evasion Filter - automatically filters posts and/or comments from suspected community ban evaders
  • Harassment filter - automatically filters comments that are likely to be considered harassing

Safety research themes and insights

Following up on the recent Q1 2024 Safety Report, we’d also like to share a couple of themes from our safety user research to show how your feedback is shaping our roadmaps for better tools and improvements.

  • Ban evaders and spammer prevention were the top ranked needs across mods: based on this research, we developed the Reputation Filter and continue to improve the Ban Evasion filter to address these top needs at scale. We focused on making these tools simpler to use and with higher accuracy detection than previous methods that mods relied on to manage these behaviors.  
  • Removals and sitewide / subreddit bans are the most important signals in evaluating user profiles: we know that reviewing a redditor’s profile to determine if they are a bad actor is challenging and time-consuming. We wanted to know more about what types of signals are used in this process so we could make them more accessible and help streamline reviews. We’re planning next steps based on this research. 

We’ll be incorporating these insights into our roadmap over the next year. Thank you to those of you who have participated in our research or given us feedback. If you have any questions, we’ll be sticking around for a bit to reply. 

edit: u/AutoModerator and not automod! Thanks!

63 Comments
2024/06/17
17:15 UTC

20

Q1 2024 Safety & Security Report

1 Comment
2024/06/13
17:26 UTC

2

More 2024 Mod Events 🎉

Hi y’all! It’s me, u/big-slay, back to announce more Mod Events for the second half of 2024! LFG.

We’ve had a blast hosting new virtual events this year, like Moddit, ModConnect, and Mod Bootcamp. We also hung out with tons of mods IRL in Atlanta, Toronto, Indianapolis, NYC, Austin, Dallas, Bangalore, Bombay, Delhi, Hamburg, Cologne, Berlin, Munich, Vienna, Hannover, and São Paulo. You can check out the recaps in r/ModEvents.

RSVPs are open now for more 2024 Mod Events!

View the homepage to see the full schedule, learn about different event types, and review the FAQs.

Virtual Events

IRL Events

We’ll keep adding events to the schedule and post them here! You can also stay updated in r/ModEvents. 

If you have any other questions, please feel free to drop them in the comments or DM me! 

Very excited to meet even more of you this year <3

Xoxo, u/big-slay

Admins & Mods at the Austin Mod Roadshow

30 Comments
2024/06/12
16:42 UTC

2

Wrapping the Golden Upvote Pilot + New(ish) and Improved Awards

Hi Mods,

I’m u/SmEllen_Fresh from the product team and I’m here with an (overdue) update on the gold and Contributor Program. We’ve reflected on how we rolled out these features, and want to rethink how we approach rewarding good contributions on Reddit. So, to close the loop on the pilot, we’re sharing some big news: today we’re launching new(ish) and improved awards. Rollout starts today on reddit.com and Reddit’s iOS and Android apps.

I’ll walk you through what’s coming, and how we got here. But first…

Where we’ve been

ICYMI, last year we released new features that we thought would make the experience of rewarding high-quality posts and comments even better. To address feedback that awards were starting to clutter posts and feeds, we replaced legacy awards with a simplified experience where users could purchase “new” gold – displayed as a golden upvote – directly with cash, rather than having to purchase coins first.

While the golden upvote was certainly simpler in theory, in practice, it missed the mark. It wasn’t as fun or expressive as legacy awards, and it was unclear how it benefited the recipient.

As part of the launch of the golden upvote, we also introduced the Contributor Program in the US. The program allows eligible users to earn cash for gold and eligible karma. (It’s worth noting that although there were understandable concerns about the Contributor Program leading to karma farming or other spam and fraud issues, we haven’t seen an increase in this behavior since the rollout 6 months ago). Unlike the golden upvote, interest in the program has grown… more on that in a second.

Finally, as part of this launch, we sunset coins. We gave those with a balance three months to spend their coins before we cleared balances and removed the monthly drip as a benefit of Reddit Premium.

Swing and a miss

Our goal is to make Reddit a place where people who make quality posts and comments get real value for their contributions, and create incentives for better comments and posts to keep your communities healthy and vibrant.

Your feedback has been spot-on throughout the process; here’s what we learned:

  • Awards need to be expressive - Awards are a core part of the Reddit experience and should be expressive. If they’re too simple, they stop being fun.
  • Awards given should visually support the recipient - The simplified golden upvote design wasn’t as fun or expressive as legacy awards, and it was unclear how it supported the recipient. (Several of you opted into the new golden upvote experience anyway, and your feedback helped us get here. We appreciate that.) Redditors love seeing other redditors get their kudos. It’s important to show the recognition contributors receive, and that their contribution matters.
  • Awards given should convey real value to the recipient - The Contributor Program now gives redditors opportunity to get a cash payout as they receive awards on their content.
  • But that value didn’t need to come at the cost of existing balances - While we had to sunset coins to implement this, we could’ve done better by our coin holders, i.e. some of the top awarders and award-recipients. Coin balances represented a commitment to rewarding comments and posts that delight fellow redditors. It was frustrating to see that disappear–even with the chance to spend down the balance.
  • Eligibility to earn cash shouldn't incentivize spam and karma farming - This is an understandable concern. We have been monitoring the Contributor Program closely and haven’t seen spam, clickbait, and trolling that could attract engagement, arising from this program since the rollout six months ago.

What we’re doing about it

We’re launching a new and improved awards experience.
We’re shouting from the rafters: Awards are back! Our goal with this refreshed experience is to bring back the fun of awards while minimizing in-feed clutter. The new experience features iconic expressions you’ll recognize in addition to new, uniquely Reddity ones. We’re also launching a leaderboard that shows the top awards for a post or comment.

To give an award, click the award icon underneath the content you’d like to recognize, select the award you want from a digestible set of fun options, and click Give Award. If you don’t have enough gold for the award, you can buy some on the same screen and give the award. Any redditor can view the awards you give in the awards leaderboard of a post or comment, unless the award is given anonymously.

Tap on the awards button in a post or comment to give an award and purchase gold

View the top awards and gold earned by a post or comment in the awards leaderboard

We’re (re)introducing gold as the way to purchase awards on Reddit.
Gold has meant a lot of things in Reddit history. It's referred to coins, Reddit Premium, and more. With the new version of Awards, gold both purchased and received will be stored as a balance on Reddit. Redditors can buy gold in bulk and spend down their balance to award content, or buy gold at the time of giving the award.

We’ve expanded the Contributor Program internationally.
We’re expanding beyond the US. Eligible redditors in 35 countries can now earn cash for gold and karma earned through their contributions to the community. While we haven’t seen an increase in spam, fraud, or moderator burden to date, we’ll continue to monitor it as we scale the program to new countries.

We’re helping you keep your communities safe.
If redditors notice potentially harmful awards on a post or comment, they can report it to you for removal if needed. Safety is paramount to us for refreshed awards - so please don’t be shy (we know you won’t be) if there are other ways we can ensure safety for your communities as awards roll back out. NSFW subreddits, trauma and addiction support subreddits, and subreddits with mature content are not eligible for awards.

We’re giving exclusive awards to coin holders.
If you had a balance when we announced that coins were going away, you’ll have access to a number of exclusive awards to give for free when we launch this week. No action required, those eligible will see a balance of these awards when awarding a post or comment starting May 15.

Exclusive awards available to coin holders

For more info, you can check out the help articles for awards, gold and Contributor Program. Comment with any questions!

101 Comments
2024/05/15
18:31 UTC

41

More desktop Mod Queue updates

Hello, mods – I’m back with another update.

In April, we unveiled the beta release of our updated desktop Mod Queue interface. Since then, we've received invaluable feedback from mods, leading to several recent improvements to the Mod Queue. Check out the latest enhancements below:

  • Mod feedback: NSFW content auto-blurring slowed down review processes. This was a bug where the Mod Queue wasn’t respecting a mod's NSFW settings (eg blur or not blur), and was blurring every image.
    • Action taken: We've squashed this bug and the queue will now respect a mod's NSFW settings.
  • Mod feedback: On certain devices, the Mod Queue's width was restrictive, hindering efficient review.
    • Action taken: We've added max-width constraints in the Mod Queue to prevent content from stretching out considerably, particularly for those using wider monitors.

Max width update

  • Mod Feedback: It would be helpful to refine the order of secondary mod actions.
    • Action taken: We've adjusted the order of secondary mod actions (lock, sticky, etc.) on Compact mode to reflect their frequency of use. We're currently developing keyboard shortcuts, and soon mods will have the ability to customize the order of these actions on their end.
  • Mod feedback: The unmoderated and edited queue is missing from this new experience.
    • Action taken: The unmoderated and edited queue have been recently incorporated.

Unmoderated and Edited Queue

  • Mod feedback: The context panel loads comments in a single comment thread view. This makes it hard to moderate in context.
    • Action taken: Clicking on a comment now scrolls to and highlights the comment in context while keeping parent comments available for context.

Comment Highlighting in the queue

  • Mod feedback: It's challenging to quickly identify the latest mod note left on a user in the queue.
    • Action taken: Mod Note labels have been added to the queue for easy recognition of the last note added.
  • Mod feedback: The location of the Mod Insights and activity panel is confusing.
    • Action taken: Initially, these panels were auto-collapsed, but we've now revised it to display them upon initial page load. Mods can close these panels by clicking the “X” button.
  • Mod feedback: It would be helpful to have guidance on utilizing the new queue and accessing its new features.
    • Action taken: An in-product onboarding feature has been added, offering mods a brief tutorial on navigating the new Mod Queue experience.

In product tutorial

Following the rollout of these improvements, we've decided to advance our beta-testing phase by making this Mod Queue version the default experience for mods accessing the latest desktop version of Reddit. However, mods will still have the option to use previous versions of the queue if preferred.

Next up, we’re actively working on building the following capabilities into the Mod Queue. These will launch over the coming months:

  • Enhanced customization: Mods will have the flexibility to personalize the order of mod actions in Compact view, tailored to their specific preferences and workflows.
  • Keyboard shortcuts: Action shortcuts will help minimize the number of clicks a mod needs to take.
  • More filters: Custom Mod Queue filters are currently being developed so mods can filter their queues to best suit their individual workflows..
  • Macros, all the macros: removal reason macros, ban macros, modmail macros, etc. are on the way and are intended to help mods craft Saved Responses!
  • Additional features in the works: enhanced user insights, automod keyword highlighting, real-time indicators, and much more!

Saying goodbye to new.reddit.

A friendly reminder - we're planning to phase out new.reddit later this year as we move forward with our updates. As always, we'll keep you posted as our plans continue to develop. If you haven't already, take a look at the new Mod Queue experience and share your thoughts. Your feedback is invaluable to us, so don’t hesitate to ask us any questions or provide input in the comments below.

70 Comments
2024/05/14
18:06 UTC

8

Sharing our Public Content Policy and a New Subreddit for Researchers

1 Comment
2024/05/09
18:59 UTC

249

New tools to help mods educate and inform community members

Greetings, mods

During numerous calls with mods last year, we consistently heard about the difficulties in informing and educating redditors about a community's rules, culture, FAQs, and other important information during key moments. This challenge is particularly pronounced on mobile platforms, where user engagement is high but community identity is less visible. Today, we're thrilled to unveil a suite of new mod tools designed to address this issue by effectively conveying information to users across various areas on Reddit.

Community Status

This week we’re launching Community Status, a new feature that will allow mods to set an editable status that shows up next to your subreddit’s name. This status will be visible to all redditors, and they’ll be able to click or tap on the status to view more information.

Mods can use this status for a variety of reasons, like highlighting live events associated with the community, commemorating cultural moments, incorporating memes and easter eggs, or showcasing specific posts from the community. This status will be visible across the popular/home feeds, post detail pages, and the community page.

Community Status User Interface

Community Highlights

In a call with moderators last year regarding community uniqueness and customization, a significant concern raised was the limited visibility of stickied posts.

  • Stickied posts, especially on mobile, are less visible due to changes that have reduced how clearly they appear in a community.
  • Only having the ability to sticky two posts is quite restrictive, and ends up placing mods in difficult compromises on what types of posts to sticky.

We understand that this has hindered moderators' ability to efficiently communicate and disseminate information within their community. To help remedy this, we’re excited to launch Community Highlights, a new supercharged pinned post experience. Next week mods will be able to do the following with Community Highlights:

  • Pin up to 6 posts.
  • Add a ‘label’ that shows up on the highlighted card, depending on what the type of post is.
  • Set an ‘expiry timer’ for how long a highlight will stay on the page.
  • Highlighted posts show up in this carousel format at the top of the page.

Used together, we intend for Community Status and Highlights to be a powerful new toolset notifying users about ongoing events within a community and assisting moderators in spotlighting posts they want to emphasize.

Community Highlights in Compact Mode

Community Highlights in Card Mode

Community Highlights Management

Post Guidance

After months of trialing Post Guidance, we’re beyond excited to drop the rope, pull the curtain back, and make this feature available to all communities, everywhere. For those unfamiliar with the feature, Post Guidance serves as a more intuitive tool where moderators can migrate and set up their subreddit rules and automoderator configurations. Users will then be preemptively alerted with a custom message that they are breaking a specific direction when trying to craft a post.

A heartfelt thank you to the 200+ mod teams who took the time to experiment with this new tool, provide us feedback and partner with us on this journey.

We’re currently building Comment Guidance (Post Guidance, but for Comments), with the goal of testing and launching it in the next couple of months.

Community Welcome Message

This July, we look forward to launching The Community Welcome Message. This feature will appear immediately after any user clicks the join button from a subreddit page. After the message is dismissed, it will be discoverable as an easy-to-use community guide on a subreddit’s About page. Mods will be able to add unique community assets and easygoing call-to-actions:

  • Community image
  • Short, custom welcome message
  • User flair selection
  • Resource links such as wiki links, join this welcome thread, and check out this funny post!

The Community Welcome Message is meant to convey the character of the community by quickly serving up the most relevant and important information to new community members while encouraging engagement.

Welcome Message User Interface

Temporary Events

Occasionally, certain events lead to significant spikes in traffic for communities, posing challenges for moderators to maintain quality and enforce rules. To manage this, moderators may switch their community's status to "Private" or "Restricted" until traffic normalizes. This not only presents challenges for moderators but also restricts and confuses well-intentioned users from participating in the community.

This July, we'll introduce a new feature called Temporary Events to address these situations. This feature empowers mods to create "temporary events" for both anticipated and unexpected scenarios. When a mod initiates an event, they can choose from various settings to efficiently manage community involvement, inform users about the event, and alert the mod team. Mods will have the flexibility to activate the temporary event as needed or schedule it in advance. Once activated, the specified settings will take effect, overriding the current community settings if necessary. When done, the subreddit will return to its standard settings

Temporary Event Mod Interface

If you have any questions, feedback, or suggestions about the features mentioned today, don’t hesitate to let us know in the comments below or via our support channels.

309 Comments
2024/05/08
17:32 UTC

0

Recognizing community milestones with new achievement badges

TL;DR Redditors can now unlock new achievement badges for completing certain contribution milestones in their communities. We’ll begin testing this experience with a small group of redditors next week. As moderators, you can select which Community achievement badges are available to community members in your subreddit through the Achievements settings in mod tools, or opt-out entirely.

Hey mods,

I’m u/SlurpingSnoodles from the community product marketing team. I’m here today to introduce you to new achievement badges that redditors can unlock for completing certain contribution milestones within their communities.

Redditors come to this platform everyday to learn, share their expertise, and have conversations across communities. For people learning their way around Reddit, we’ve been testing out achievement badges for completing challenges across the platform—which some of you may have noticed in your profile (like “Nice Post”, “Conversation Starter”, or “Person of Interests”).

Now, redditors can also be recognized for their meaningful contribution and consistent dedication with Community achievement badges in subs they’re a part of. Starting next week, we’ll begin testing Community achievements with a small group—which means a few members of your subreddits may start seeing these badges soon.

Without further ado, let’s go through some of the details so you can decide if you’d like to make these badges available to redditors in communities you moderate.

Unlocking achievement badges: Community achievement badges will be unlocked on redditors’ profiles when they hit the following milestones:

  • Poster Prodigy - You are in the top 10% of posters based on upvotes, in any of your communities, at the end of the month.
  • Opinion Oracle - You are in the top 10% of commenters based on upvotes, in any of your communities, at the end of the month.
  • Repeat Contributor - You post or comment in the same community for 30 total days.
  • Content Connoisseur - You vote on a post or comment at least five times in a day for 30 total days.
  • Flag Planter - You are one of the first five commenters in the first 24 hours of a post for 30 total days
  • Elder - You complete 3 years in a community.

*These milestones may evolve as we test out this experience. Unlocked badges will continue to stay as is.

Some achievements can be unlocked in more than one community and multiple times within the same community. Once a badge is unlocked, it stays that way. Tapping on any badge in the achievement showcase will reveal the list of communities where it’s been unlocked. Any achievement can be shared on and off Reddit through the share button on the achievement detail page.

The achievement detail page includes more on how and where the badge was unlocked along with the option to share the achievement with others

Viewing achievements: Redditors can view achievement badges through their profile on reddit.com and Reddit’s mobile apps. Think of these badges as an extension of trophies, given by Reddit for participating in certain moments or accomplishing certain tasks. (Trophies can still be viewed on the profile page.)

All unlocked badges across categories will appear in your main achievements showcase. You can tap into any category to expand the list of achievements.

Selecting Community achievements as moderators: Eligible subreddits are currently opted-in to all community achievements outlined above (more on eligibility criteria here). Starting today, mods of eligible communities have the option to opt their subreddit out of specific Community achievements or opt-out entirely, through the Achievements settings in mod tools. If you decide to opt your community out, redditors will not receive badges when completing those achievements in your subreddit. This mod setting is only applicable to the Community achievement category.

Subreddits with mature content and/or private and restricted subreddits will not be eligible for Community achievements. Communities dedicated to topics that may be perceived as sensitive for some redditors (e.g. trauma support) will be defaulted to opt-out with the option to opt-in through the mod setting.

Comment below in case of any questions!

Note: You may have seen in our recent post that we will soon be sharing news about the next chapter for Awards. To clarify, unlike Awards that are given by redditors to recognize each other’s valuable content, achievement badges are unlocked by Reddit for hitting milestones and completing certain challenges. We promise, more on Awards soon.

52 Comments
2024/05/03
16:22 UTC

0

Adopt-an-Admin: Insights, updates, and announcing our next round!

TL;DR:

Hello, mods!
I’m u/techiesgoboom, here with u/tiz, from Reddit’s Community team. We support Adopt-an-Admin (AAA), a program that embeds Reddit admins (aka Reddit employees) in mod teams, where they moderate alongside you to grow their empathy and understanding of the mod experience. Four months ago, we announced our goal of having every existing and new admin participate in the program. Keep reading to learn a few takeaways from this round, what’s next for the Adopt-an-Admin program, and how you can join the fun.

March 2024 Adopt-an-Admin by the numbers

  • 85 admins participated
  • 49 subreddits participated
  • 85% of mods report they would participate again

Participant takeaways from this round

Admin from our legal team wrote:

AAA was a great opportunity to learn directly from our Mods and get an appreciation for all of the effort they put into maintaining their communities. I don't think anyone can understand Reddit fully until they've had some mod experience, and this is a great way to do it.

Admin from our community team wrote:

This program allows you to understand Reddit moderators at a deeper level and will help develop empathy for those who volunteer their time to keep Reddit vibrant and safe. Participating in this program will provide you with insights that will be instrumental when working on your day to day job especially those in roles that affect the Reddit user base.

Mod said:

AAA is a rare opportunity for admin and moderators to engage with each other on a close level, and is a necessary reminder for both sides that we are all individual humans.

Mod said:

I set out with the expectation that the team would be giving up our time to teach admins about moderation, to focus on the specific areas where it pertained to their working day, and to give them a flavour of the requirements and challenges of moderators, as end users. What we got was exceptional interaction, friendly, intelligent learning and, from the conference calls we had with our admin, a superb, engaged and useful temporary addition to the team.

What’s new for the next round of Adopt-an-Admin?

While we got a lot of positive feedback from admin and mod participants (as you read above), we also learned about some areas for improvement. 19% of admins reported they weren’t able to participate fully this past round, which meant that some mod teams didn’t get the full Adopt-an-Admin experience they had expected. This is top of mind for us to improve, so we’re introducing the following changes to the program:

  • Flex rounds! We know that life can get busy, so mods and admins will now have the opportunity to select a time period that works best for their schedules.
  • Instead of us pairing admins with mods based on topic of interest, admins will now have to apply to the mod teams they’re interested in and share their time commitment and availability ahead of time.
  • The first moment of “adoption” will be an introductory meeting where mods and admins can chat through expectations.

We’ll continue to stay in touch with participating mods and admins to make sure we’re addressing feedback and improving Adopt-an-Admin along the way.

In addition to the above changes, we’re also continuing to scale to reach our goal of having all existing and new admins participate in the program. So far in 2024, 5% of Reddit admins have participated! We’re aiming for an even bigger round this June, where we’ll test flex-rounds and everything behind the scenes needed to support it (hint, it’s a lot) before stepping up again for July-August.

Want to participate in an upcoming round? Sign up for AAA here! Note, if you are already in the Adopt-an-Admin program subreddit for your community you do not have to sign up again.

Want to learn more? If you want to learn more about Adopt-an-Admin, please join us for an upcoming Moddit event on May 10, 2024 from 2:30pm - 3:00pm PT! Moddit is a new virtual moderator event series where you’ll hear quick, concise live presentations on topics relevant to you.

At the event, you’ll get an inside look at the first quarter of our company-wide Adopt-An-Admin initiative: what we learned, how we can improve, and how your community can get involved. Plus, the event chat will be open 30 minutes before and after for networking (if you’re into that kind of thing!). Register for the event here.

Whew, that was a long one! Thanks for reading.

If you’ve made it this far, comment with a song to prove that you made it to the end. I'll listen to all the songs this week, and report back about whether I regretted this commitment! We’ll stick around for a bit to answer questions.

90 Comments
2024/05/01
16:17 UTC

0

Saying goodbye to the mobile Mod Feed.

Hello, mods

Over the past year, we’ve made numerous improvements to the mobile mod experience, namely the mobile Mod Queue and post details page (see here for our most recent update). These improvements have largely made the Mod Feed redundant (for those unfamiliar with it, Mod Feed was another section where moderators could oversee the content within their community). As such, we intend to phase out the Mod Feed.

Why the change? Over the last six months, we've seen a noticeable drop in traffic to the mobile Mod Feed. This lines up with the ongoing improvements we’ve made to the mobile Mod Queue. Mods are increasingly using the Mod Queue or Post Details page (PDP) to manage most of their community content. We want to continue enhancing these areas for mods and focus our resources on fewer, better interfaces.

What does this mean for mods?

In 2 weeks we’ll remove access to the Mod Feed from our apps. After that, toggling between the different queue filters (e.g., Unmoderated) in the Mod Queue will provide much of the same experience as the Mod Feed did.

Looking ahead, we'll continue to launch mobile features to improve how mods can handle and manage content in their communities. As we gear up for the next round of planning, we'd love to hear your thoughts on the features or enhancements you'd like to see prioritized and developed. Feel free to share your ideas in the comments below!

47 Comments
2024/04/25
18:38 UTC

0

Celebrating two years of Community Funds… and don’t miss Reddit Meetup Week!

1 Comment
2024/04/23
19:06 UTC

0

What We’re Working on in 2024

0 Comments
2024/04/17
20:58 UTC

0

Reddit Transparency Report: Jul-Dec 2023

1 Comment
2024/04/16
17:15 UTC

0

Introducing…Reddit Meetup Week; June 8-15, 2024!

1 Comment
2024/04/11
20:46 UTC

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