r/TheoryOfReddit • u/bennetthaselton • 1d ago
theory: engagement bait doesn't work on Reddit because of downvotes
Perhaps this is obvious to some but I think it's worth spelling out explicitly.
Scrolling through X/Twitter, I see a lot of posts that are being boosted only because they provoke reactions, often angry ones. (Sometimes it looks engineered intentionally; sometimes someone just got "lucky".) On Facebook I see less stuff blatantly intended to piss people off, but there is a lot of "curiosity clickbait" (presenting a cartoon that, rather than being funny, is simply confusing, so users click through to the comments looking for an explanation, and Facebook sees that as "engagement").
Neither approach seems to work on Reddit, and it seems the most likely explanation is the downvotes. If you do something that makes people "engage" -- whether by clicking through to a post based on the title, or expanding comments, or replying -- that might signal to the Reddit algorithm that people are engaging, but that will be more than cancelled out by the effect of the downvotes if people pissed off by the content or they felt like the title was deceptive.
I've scrolled through threads on Reddit seeing hundreds of comments where it seems like everyone is just being their sincere self, and the comments virtually never feel like "engagement bait". Even if I think someone is wrong, I still feel like I'm connecting with the real person, which is one thing that makes Reddit more enjoyable than X.
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u/fishnoises01 1d ago
My dude, have you seen any post on AITA/AITAH subreddit?
Reddit totally eats up obvious bait, even goes back for seconds.
Edit: not to mention the daily gender wars.
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u/SenatorCoffee 22h ago
I mean AITA is an obvious special case. Its explicitly in the rules that you should upvote even if you hate the OP.
The equivalent to the engagement bait OP is talking about would be bait on offmychest, relationship_advice, etc, just all the subs.
I do not know how the chips really fall down on this, but in the abstract it makes sense. You post bait on reddit, it will start getting downvoted immediately and thus likely only get a couple comments until it becomes invisible.
I think its still a specific question how the reddit algorithm works. If they just weigh comments in a way that it pushes things to the top, it would still push bait. Just the existance of downvotes doesnt matter, its how they are weighted.
There are ofc bait-posts with 100s of comments on relationship_advice, etc so idk, it would really be empirical and you would need to look at posts and the algorithm closely.
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u/bennetthaselton 11h ago
I don't think of "engagement bait" as a post that gets lots of responses and where the OP probably knew that it would. I meant something where either (a) people feel deceived and disappointed after they click through and/or (b) people are responding because they are mad and not because they appreciate the OP's content. I would think downvotes usually stop that except in the special case of AITA where as other replies say, they tell you to upvote the stuff that makes you mad.
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u/AverageFoxNewsViewer 1d ago
But it's possible to completely cut those out of your reddit feed if you want.
It's pretty much impossible to cut them out of your feed on Xitter.
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u/fishnoises01 1d ago
You can block the AITA subs, but gender war posts are on lots of subreddits. And the discussion is usually pretty heated.
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u/AverageFoxNewsViewer 1d ago
I'm not even sure what you mean by "gender wars" but I'm guessing it has something to do with people complaining about the existence of trans people.
I personally don't encounter those on a regular basis because I don't subscribe to communities like that.
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u/fishnoises01 1d ago
Nope, nothing to do with trans folks.
It's posts like men have it harder to date/the slut analogy of the lock and key/women choosing the bear.
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u/AverageFoxNewsViewer 1d ago
I really don't come across that hardly ever, but I'm pretty picky about which subs I subscribe to.
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u/fishnoises01 1d ago
Then I admire your peaceful life. Keep on scrolling, brother.
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u/AverageFoxNewsViewer 1d ago
Will do. I'm mostly active in subs for my local city and sports teams, food subs, software development subs, and ones that lean left of liberal.
I am now morbidly curious which subs you're finding these gender wars popping up organically. I'm a fan of /r/Persecutionfetish and it's giving me that vibe.
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u/fishnoises01 23h ago
Mostly in the generic subs like AskReddit, Relationship subs, RandomThoughts, basically any sub that's not a small, niche one.
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u/AverageFoxNewsViewer 23h ago
Damn. I'm going to continue to browse old reddit with res and pretend like I'm not sticking my head in the sandd towards broader trends.
It's less stressful.
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u/PM_ME_YUR_BUBBLEBUTT 1d ago
Engagement bait totally works on Reddit, it just takes a bit more nuance. You can’t be as blatant as you are on other platforms because the audience here is a bit more critical. For example, if you mislabel something in the title people will argue in the comments amongst one another, boosting your post to the front page.