Reddit is a vestige of the 0% and low-interest rate world we all lived in up until early 2022. Same goes for lots of this crap that can only survive in a 0% rate environment. In such a reality, they need to centralize faster and extract more free labor, bomb the API bridges, develop more addictive algorithms, collect revenue with subscription payments, pop-ups and other abusive practices. Take, take, take, because they have to deliver quarterly to their own fiat overlords after an IPO, or worse, some fiat creation in the form of a wealthy individual buys it all and takes the thing private, willing to squander the money to satisfy megalomania, which is just a new version of the prior fiat creations buying ownership stakes in newspapers. It's all added too much distortion for me to deal with anymore. The SN and Nostr models are built around all that trouble of rates, closed-source, permissions, etc. They've impressively existed only in higher-rate environments and a bitcoin bear market.

Did r/cryptocurrency actually take Moons seriously? Wasn't it just some playful thing where no one cared too much what happened to it?

I have no idea since I never hanged out there. But if they were taking it seriously, then they're bigger fools than I even thought.

I mean I wish I could share your view on being learning the hard way but I don't. I mean if SN rugged me it would not impact me in any way. Its just not enough money to make that kind of impression. I mean people make really dumb decisions financially all the time and they don't learn. On top of that posting on Reddit or SN for that matter isn't hard work. Its not a job. Its cool and I support SN users by zapping them. Its cool but its not like someone took my paycheck.

I've had my bank account locked up with more than three months income unavailable. That's how you learn a lesson. I'm glad you have learned but that's probably more about you than this event.

many new maxi bitcoiners may be born today :D

now seriously, thinking about it, maybe the community will find another use for the MOON token, maybe programming some kind of Reddit clone that uses moon token even in a better way. The tokens don't depend on Reddit.

I'm sure many users will leave Reddit and will search for better places, like... Stacker News ! :)

i wonder if the lntipbot still works in r/bitcoin. but not enough to actually check myself.

Oh, haha. Totally forgot. Stopped using Reddit when the blackouts happened. Forgot about my stack of moons.

Oh well.

Honestly the more time I spend here, the less drawn I am to Reddit and its subreddits. I love the genuineness here where people speak their minds unreservedly and share their experiences so openly

While those who earned them just had paper losses, those who bought them lol they're the real suckers, but yes regardless of how you got suckered into a honeypot, a rugpull is still a bitter reality to swallow, but theres always going to be a group that thinks this time is different and go back for a second/fifth rugging

Sadly we will still see many more of these, everyday someone new has enough clout or gets enough influencers to sell out so a pump and dump can happen and all those rugs also add up. We often don't see them because rugging 100k to 5 million doesn't make the headlines anymore or ever did, but they still happen.

The right lesson here is that moons where essentially unregistered securities (hence why they where citing regulatory compliance).

The wrong lesson is that all of crypto including Bitcoin falls into the same bucket.

It's good to see many comments understanding the difference but I suspect there's also many people that still don't understand the difference including the mainstream media.

Did people buy them? Or only earned?

As Odell says (paraphrasing):

The ruggings will continue until people hold their own keys.

Sorry for those people that got fucked by a counter party. Dust yourself off, it's the perfect time of year to join the 'Children of the Corn' hahah

Here's more about today's news about this via Laura Shin's Unchained website: author: Juan Aranovich

Posted October 17, 2023 at 5:54 pm EST.

Reddit has discontinued its Community Points program, a move that has led to a sharp drop in the value of associated tokens and ignited strong reactions from the community.

Initially unveiled in 2020, the program aimed to incentivize user engagement within select subreddits by awarding Ethereum-based tokens, MOON and BRICK, specific to the r/Cryptocurrency and r/FortniteBR subreddits, respectively.

Tim Rathschmidt, Reddit’s director of consumer and product communications, cited scalability issues and an evolving regulatory environment as the primary reasons for the phase-out. “The resourcing needed was unfortunately too high to justify,” Rathschmidt told TechCrunch, adding that the regulatory landscape has further complicated matters. The tokens, redeemable for various Reddit perks, were stored in Reddit’s Vault, a crypto wallet.

The market impact was immediate. MOON tokens plummeted by 84%, currently priced at $0.036, while BRICK tokens decreased 40%  and are now valued at $0.058.

The decision has not been well-received by the Reddit community. Pseudonymous users have expressed strong sentiments, with comments like “hope you made plenty of money with us, bastards,” “there are going to be some lawsuits here (…) a rug pull is not taken lightly” and “you guys crushed thousands of people’s dreams and fortune within seconds.”

Reddit initially used the Ethereum network for the Community Points program but transitioned to Arbitrum Nova in 2022 to mitigate high transaction fees and limited bandwidth. This move also proved ineffective for scaling the program.

Earlier this year, Reddit ended its coin system, which allowed users to purchase Gold and other currencies to award other users. The platform has since introduced the Contributor Program, which allows users to convert Reddit gold and karma into real currency.

While Reddit is moving away from blockchain-based rewards, the platform is still exploring other avenues for community governance and contributions. Rathschmidt emphasized that Reddit is investing in products that aim to achieve what the Community Points program initially sought but in a more scalable and understandable manner.