Reddit removes years of chat and message archives from customers’ accounts
The Reddit blackout protests did not fairly pressure the corporate to reverse course on its API adjustments that resulted within the shutdown of many standard third-party apps, nevertheless it did achieve dominating the dialog across the platform for weeks.
Nevertheless, whereas everybody was listening to the protests, Reddit made another huge adjustments to its platform. A type of adjustments resulted within the elimination of years of customers’ non-public conversations on the platform.
Over the previous few weeks, many Redditors have reported(opens in a new tab) the disappearance(opens in a new tab) of their non-public chat logs and messages shared between different Reddit customers over time. Mashable additionally observed the identical on two reporters’ private accounts. Messages and stay chats from earlier than 2023 are not accessible by customers.
“I misplaced EVERY.SINGLE.ONE(opens in a new tab). of my Chats – 7 years of historical past I used to be saving,” posted one Redditor. “I simply found this and I’m devastated. I’ve misplaced contacts with Redditors I wished to avoid wasting, a ton of analysis shared backwards and forwards, info that isn’t accessible wherever publicly.”
“Met my spouse on reddit…disappointing we misplaced these first messages,” one other person posted.
Mashable confirmed with Reddit that messages and chat historical past are not accessible in the event that they have been made previous to January 1, 2023. A Reddit spokesperson forwarded Mashable a changelog announcement(opens in a new tab) made on June 22 the place the corporate shared that these messages can be eliminated.
“In our continued pursuit of empowering communities, we’re transitioning to a brand new chat infrastructure,” reads the changelog discover. “In an effort to have a clean and fast transition to this new infrastructure, we are going to migrate chat messages despatched from January 1, 2023 onward. This transformation will likely be efficient beginning June thirtieth.”
It seems many Redditors missed the discover, which seems after two different function bulletins, a minimum of ten paragraphs into the changelog submit. The discover additionally does not explicitly say that messages from earlier than 2023 will likely be eliminated. As well as, some Redditors have shared that their messages and chats disappeared from their account days earlier than the June 30 date.
“I am fairly upset on the method Reddit selected to do that (and that I did not get any messages from Reddit warning customers about this),” one Redditor wrote on the platform.
In response to the suggestions in one of many posts, a Reddit admin defined that Reddit was “migrating legacy chats to the brand new platforms and, sadly, solely information for 2023 is replicated.”
The best way to probably recuperate a number of the lacking Reddit messages
The admin did present a possible answer for some customers to entry their previous chats. It seems some customers might be able to obtain all their messages, together with ones previous to 2023, by making an information request at https://www.reddit.com/settings/data-request(opens in a new tab) whereas logged into their Reddit account.
Mashable was profitable in retrieving previous messages and chats not displaying in a person account by this technique. As well as, utilizing the previous model of Reddit which continues to be accessible at https://old.reddit.com(opens in a new tab), customers should be capable to entry inbox messages previous to 2023. Nevertheless, previous stay chats aren’t accessible right here as they have been launched beneath the brand new model of Reddit in 2018.
Nevertheless, some Redditors have reported that even the info request choice didn’t retrieve their previous chats or some messages have been lacking. Whereas Mashable’s information request took a couple of minutes, it will probably take as much as 30 days for some to obtain the downloadable file with their information.
Reddit adjustments proceed to pile up
Together with the current API adjustments and chat historical past elimination, Reddit has additionally made one other determination unpopular with its customers. On Friday, Reddit introduced it was ending its Reddit Gold reward system and confronted instant backlash from its customers.
Most social media platforms at this time present customers with the flexibility to export their content material and supply ample warning earlier than the corporate decides to delete information from its servers. Nonetheless although, customers who place sentimental worth on what they submit on social networks ought to usually make native backups of their information. In 2019, years after it was final related, MySpace introduced that it had misplaced greater than 12 years price of customers’ information, similar to music and pictures. Many former customers, who hadn’t accessed the platform in over a decade, have been nonetheless outraged over the lack of their on-line information.