- Reddit and OpenAI have announced a partnership to bring new AI-powered features to Reddit, with OpenAI becoming an advertising partner.
- Redditors have expressed concerns about how Reddit’s executives manage the platform, with over 7,000 subreddits going dark in 2023 due to protests over API pricing changes.
- Reddit CEO Steve Huffman believes the partnership will help connect people with more of what they’re looking for and expand Reddit’s community.
With the agreement it inked, OpenAI will have access to Reddit’s data API in real-time, allowing it to surface talks from the platform in ChatGPT and other new products. This accord bears resemblance to the $60 million deal Reddit inked with Google earlier this year.
AI-powered features for Reddit
Reddit and OpenAI have announced a partnership that will allow Reddit to bring new AI-powered features to Redditors and moderators using OpenAI’s large language models. OpenAI has also signed up to become an advertising partner on Reddit.
Redditor reactions and past controversies
Redditors have been vocal about how Reddit’s executives manage the platform, and there is concern about how they will react to this announcement. Over 7,000 subreddits went dark in June 2023 due to user protests over Reddit’s API pricing changes. Recently, following news of a partnership between OpenAI and the programming messaging board Stack Overflow, people were suspended after trying to delete their posts.
Undisclosed financial details and training data
The financial terms of the deal were not revealed, and there was no mention of training data, which is different from Reddit’s previous deal with Google, where Reddit stated it would provide Google with data to train models more efficiently. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is a shareholder in Reddit, but the partnership was led by OpenAI’s COO and approved by its independent Board of Directors.
Reddit CEO’s perspective on the partnership
Reddit CEO Steve Huffman believes that including Reddit in ChatGPT upholds the belief in a connected internet, helps people find more of what they’re looking for, and helps new audiences find community on Reddit.
Reddit’s past stance on data scraping
Reddit has not always been friendly towards companies scraping its data to train AI models, and it has threatened to block Google web crawlers from accessing the site. OpenAI has also reportedly told the moderators of the r/ChatGPT subreddit that they violated OpenAI’s copyright by using the ChatGPT logo as a display photo.
