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ChatGPT to face tougher regulation in the EU

2026-08-31T10:17:34-04:00

OpenAI will soon be held accountable for mitigating risks related to ChatGPT's impact on minors, user mental health, and the spread of illegal content in the European Union. That's because ChatGPT is now considered a Very Large Online Search Engine under the EU's Digital Services Act, a set of laws regulating major online services and platforms.

Along with ChatGPT, the European Commission also announced that Reddit and Roblox are considered Very Large Online Platforms, subjecting them to the same rules. The DSA restricts platforms from targeting ads to minors or using a person's sexual orientation, religion, ethnicity, or political beliefs. …

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Reddit’s AI is turning posts into podcasts and short videos

2026-08-17T21:51:22-04:00

Reddit is trying out a new way for people to take in content on Reddit: by turning text posts into audio / video content. As part of an experiment, some posts are being adapted into videos that use AI voices to read the text of the main post and some comments. The video highlights the text as it's read by the AI voice, and under the video, a note says that it's a "Real conversation voiced by AI."

An old post in r/boardgames from eight years ago with 101 responses to a request for good road trip games that adults will like is an example of Reddit's AI at work. Instead of the usual text thread, it has the main question above a three-minute vi …

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Reddit is introducing a new moderator: AI

2026-08-05T12:48:11-04:00

Reddit is enlisting AI to help moderate new subreddits - and eventually the rest of site. The company is introducing automated moderation tools that rely on LLMs to help mods manage their communities, and it's expanding who can use those tools today ahead of a full launch later this year.

The company calls the suite of tools "Rules Hub," and the tools let mods decide what rules should be automatically enforced and what should happen when a rule is triggered. Rules Hub relies on LLMs to evaluate "whether a post or comment matches the intent of a rule," which "allows Rules Hub to better handle nuance, natural language, and edge cases while pr …

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Can Reddit fend off a new wave of AI SEO spam?

2026-08-04T10:05:17-04:00

Earlier this year, a Reddit user had asked members of a skincare-focused subreddit if anyone had tried a specific hypochlorous acid spray, a product often used for acne. There were dozens of responses; one from a user named Primary-Taro4254 seemed innocuous enough, at least at first.

"I haven't personally tried [that brand] so I can't fully compare, sorry," they commented. "But I have been using a similar hypochlorous acid spray from Honeydew Labs and I've honestly really liked it."

Primary-Taro4254 helpfully shared their experience using the spray to calm their skin's redness and irritation, and even threw in some of Honeydew Labs' crede …

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Reddit is moving on from r/all

2026-04-02T17:56:30-04:00

Reddit is deprecating r/all, one of its feeds that shows popular posts on the platform, as part of "ongoing efforts to simplify Reddit and improve Home feed personalization."

Reddit has offered both r/popular and r/all as ways to see trending posts, with r/all being a "less filtered feed" where "sexually explicit posts are filtered out but other popular Not Safe for Work (NSFW) posts are included." But in January, Reddit said it had removed r/all from its apps as part of an "experiment" and that, as part of a separate experiment, some desktop users wouldn't see r/all in their sidebar. (The company earlier announced r/all's removal from its …

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Reddit accounts with ‘fishy’ bot-like behavior will soon need to prove they’re human

2026-03-25T12:34:03-04:00

Reddit is taking new steps to identify bots on the platform - a process that may require some users to confirm that they're human. In a post on Wednesday, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman writes that the company will introduce a labeling system for accounts registered as bots, and ask users with "automated" or "fishy behavior" to verify that they're human using methods like fingerprint scanning or submitting their ID.

With this update, developers can register automated accounts with Reddit, which will then receive an "[APP]" label. However, Reddit also notes that it will be on the lookout for unlabeled accounts with suspicious behavior. "If somethi …

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Digg’s open beta shuts down after just two months, blaming AI bot spam

2026-03-13T16:51:15-04:00

It's only been a year since Digg founder Kevin Rose, Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian, and a few others announced the link-sharing site would relaunch, promising a "social discovery built by communities, not by algorithms." Now, two months after opening its Reddit-like platform to the public, Digg is announcing a "hard reset" that's shutting down operations and will "significantly downsize the Digg team."

When they announced its relaunch, Rose told The Verge that AI could "remove the janitorial work of moderators and community managers." Now, the new Digg's CEO Justin Mezzell writes in a note pinned to the homepage that, "We knew bots were …

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Reddit is testing verification

2025-12-10T14:33:26-05:00

Reddit is starting to test verified profiles, the company announced today. Users who are verified as part of this "limited alpha test" will have a gray checkmark next to their username "across profiles, communities, feeds, post detail pages, and search results."

For this "initial test," Reddit says it's "selected a group of public figures and trusted partners," and they'll need to opt in, have accounts in good standing, and "actively contribute" on the platform. Reddit notes that verification "doesn't grant special privileges."

Currently, users can't request verification. Businesses that already have the "Official" label that Reddit starte …

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Reddit’s CEO says r/popular ‘sucks,’ and it’s going away

2025-12-04T11:31:15-05:00

Reddit CEO Steve Huffman. | Photo: Getty Images

Reddit is "moving away" from r/popular, the default feed for new users, and plans to replace it with "better, more relevant and personalized feeds," according to CEO Steve Huffman (aka Spez). Huffman also notes that r/popular "sucks."

"For a long while, we were known as the 'front page of the internet,' but we've outgrown a singular front page for everyone," Huffman says. "You have different interests than I do, and your Reddit should look different from mine. And from your neighbor's, or your coworker's, or your best friend's."

Regarding r/popular, he says that "in theory, it's what's most popular on Reddit, but it's actually what is like …

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Reddit sues Perplexity for allegedly ripping its content to feed AI

2025-10-23T11:58:07-04:00

Reddit is suing Perplexity and three "data-scraping service providers" to "stop the industrial-scale, unlawful circumvention of data protections by a group of bad actors who will stop at nothing to get their hands on valuable copyrighted content on Reddit," according to the complaint.

The company equates the data scraping companies - SerpApi, Oxylabs, and AWMProxy - to "would-be bank robbers" who "knowing they cannot get into the bank vault, break into the armored truck carrying the cash instead." Reddit alleges that Perplexity is a customer of "at least one" of the data scraping companies, saying that it "will apparently do anything to get …

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