Being the CEO of a massive forum such as Reddit means that you hold an incredible amount of power over what is posted on the platform. Typically as long as a post is made within the guidelines of the community, it is largely left alone, but it seems that Reddit’s CEO Steve Huffman landed himself in a bit of trouble by crossing that line.It seems that Huffman was recently caught secretly editing the posts of Reddit users who are particularly critical of him. To be more specific, he was editing the posts made on the r/The_Donald subreddit, which is the community for Donald Trump’s supporters. Huffman was a target of abuse in the community and while many might have largely ignored the postings, Huffman decided enough was enough.
When he was caught, Huffman admitted to it in a post which said, “Yep. I messed with the “fuck u/spez” comments. It’s been a long week here trying to unwind the r/pizzagate stuff. As much as we try to maintain a good relationship with you all, it does get old getting called a pedophile constantly. As the CEO, I shouldn’t play such games, and it’s all fixed now. Our community team is pretty pissed at me, so I most assuredly won’t do this again.”
Unsurprisingly many users weren’t too happy with what Huffman did, with some claiming that it breached their trust by doing so. Even Reddit’s moderators were shocked by Huffman’s actions, with one saying that this actually united the entire community, even those who aren’t Trump supporters, against him. Some have called for Huffman’s resignation although he has yet to respond to those calls.
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