The Exchanges

Q What role did the Reddit communities play in this process?

A Well, so one of the reasons to go public is I wanted our, our users who have a sense of ownership over Reddit, a deep sense of ownership that they've earned, right? Everything interesting about Reddit is created by our users. I wanted them to be able to actually be owners of Reddit. And so part of, part of our IPO was doing one of the largest directed share programs ever to let users buy into the IPO at the IPO price at 34 dollars. In a normal IPO, what would happen is the retail investors, they invest at the first trade. So if there's a pop, it would be higher. So we popped to 47 dollars. That would normally be their price. But we're like, we want the users to be able to buy in at the same price that the IPO investors get. And my only regret is not getting more users into that program. We actually had capacity to do a lot more, um, The, what we were fighting, and I, I learned some lessons here. Uh, we had within the last year of, during our IPO, we got in a big fight with our user base over the API, API access. So a lot of the users were mad at us and then didn't invest in the IPO. And because of the quiet period, you can't really say anything. You can't sell the stock. And there's good reasons for that, obviously. Um, So there was a, a negative sentiment among our users. So we did get a lot in. Every user who came into our DSP, we fulfilled their full order, and I just wish w…

AI assessment note: “part of our IPO was doing one of the largest directed share programs ever”

Q That's pretty good. Great. And what was it? It was When you joined in 2015, you're at twelve million in revenue. So you went from twelve million in revenue in 2015, rejoined, to 2025 of 2.2 billion. Did you think that was going to happen?

A In 2015, I didn't, I did not think that was going to happen because I didn't think more than maybe a week ahead. We were so in the present then. So in the present, just trying to save the company, turn the company around. So, no, I did not think that was gonna happen. Um, and, you know, we, we found our, it took a while to find our voice on the business side. Turns out, I mean, turns out ads is great. Ads, um, as a business model, this is coming from the person. I told you, I didn't like ads. Um, Add scales. So it's, it's a business model that scales with usage. So it's very healthy there. Um, and it turns out it's a business model that's aligned with just what people talk about, which is what Reddit is. And so, uh, there's a natural fit. Um, I think one of the most important things we did. So my partner in running Reddit is Jen Wong. She joined us. She's our COO. She joined us in 2018. And. One of the biggest decisions we made around then was we were going to invest in our own ad tech. So our own ad server, our own tracking, our own measurement, all of this. We were small to do that. Um, and we moved off of programmatic. So most websites or platforms smaller than Reddit will use some ad network. Um, so if somebody else sells your ads for you, you just basically, and you, and you split it. So you give them the inventory, they sell it, you take a rev share. We said, as a matter …

AI assessment note: “In 2015, I didn't, I did not think that was going to happen”

Q Through the different generations of social media and media in general, we've gone through things like forums, we've gone through different social feeds, mobile, now we're having different algorithms and AI. What have your biggest learnings through those different waves been? And how has Reddit endured?

A So, The things that are important to Reddit, we've talked about. It's communities. It's authenticity. It's, you know, alongside those things, maybe being stubborn. Not making changes too quickly. But the UI, the pixels, the formats, the platforms, That's all for grabs. Those things evolve. So I think what we've been able to do is evolve on the things that matter, like the platforms, you know, move to mobile, um, the style has changed, support more content. Like Reddit used to be only links. Right now it's links and texts and images and video and, um, you know, we don't have audio yet. I'd love to have audio. Um, but the communities, the authenticity, the voting, the human poweredness, even where Reddit has algorithms, um, at the end of the day, nothing can become popular on Reddit without a community of people within the context of their values voting on it and making it popular. Those are the qualities of Reddit we protect, But then we have to just continue to evolve, and we will, you know, we have and will continue to do so. So I think it's, yeah, being stubborn about the right things, but otherwise evolving on almost everything else.

AI assessment note: “being stubborn about the right things, but otherwise evolving on almost everything else.”

Q of infrastructure frontier labs Need to train superintelligence. Visit Turing.com slash S-O-U-R-C-E-R-Y. Is this how you transitioned so seamlessly with a huge splash into training data? So I think last time I checked, Reddit has done over twenty four billion posts and comments, and so these platforms like OpenAI are using the training data in their algorithms for their LLMs, that kind of thing. How did that come to be?

A Well, that's been an interesting third chapter for us, right? If the first chapter of Reddit is Reddit's not traditional media. That, that was, that was our thinking 20 years ago. It was just, we need an, another source of information. And then the second chapter was Reddit's not social media. Um, you know, Reddit's different than social media. It's organized around communities, not the, what I call the F's. Friends, family, famous people, followers. Um, now we're in this third chapter, which is Reddit's not AI. But in an interesting paradox, Reddit is the fuel for AI. So if you have a question on the internet, pre-AI and post-AI, where is the answer going to come from? Ultimately, the answer is going to come from other people, which are on Reddit. This is one, Reddit is one of the best supplies of, of human intelligence. And so, yeah, Reddit's data has been used to train every large language model you've heard of, some with and others without our permission, which has, you know, been a, uh, a situation to navigate, um, but with our biggest partners, Google and OpenAI, you know, we do it on purpose, and I think it's worked well. I think, um, Uh, those, you know, big search products help people discover Reddit, help people learn that Reddit has communities relevant to them, which is one of our biggest challenges. At this point, everybody's heard about Reddit, but not everybody r…

AI assessment note: “with our biggest partners, Google and OpenAI, you know, we do it on purpose”

Q You've been public nearly two years now. What's that been like? What's the status of the business today?

A So, being public is great, and, and I, I've, I've, it's like a side hobby of mine to catch other CEOs who are thinking about going public and tell them that they should. I mean, there's a, there's, there's one big if there, which is like, if you're ready, um, but I feel like There was so much, it's easy to find feedback. It's easy to find a CEO who took their company public and then regrets it, and doesn't, it doesn't make sense to me. You know, you, you get to do this really incredible thing. For many people, it's It's a once in a life, for most people, it's a once in a lifetime thing that I think anybody in business would aspire to, or most people in business would aspire to. And then you spend the rest of your career bitching about it. It just, that doesn't, and it's like so great for the business, it's so great for employees, and, you know, you, you, you do right by your investors, you know, in theory. Um, and I think for us, all those things are true. Very happy for our employees and for the, the people who, you know, supported Reddit along the way. And it's also made us a better business. Like the rigor, the routine, the pressure, I think all of that has really helped us. So there's no question we would not be where we are today without going public. And being public's not so bad. You kind of get in the routine of things, and, and, and it's nice. Going public is tough. Li…

AI assessment note: “So, being public is great, and, and I, I've, it's like a side hobby”

Q Maybe. So Reddit's been around for 20 years. My brother Colin had a pressing question he really wanted to ask. What is the next 20 years gonna look like for Reddit?

A So, 20 years, everything's going to change. If we look back on the last 20 years, like the, the format changes, the pixels change, how you discover Reddit, all, a lot of those mechanics have evolved. What's not going to change is the core of Reddit, which is communities, That hold conversations, right? It's communities of people talking about things they care about, uh, voting, user submission, uh, that users do everything interesting about Reddit. That is Reddit, but everything else has to evolve. You know, it always does. Like, 20 years is old, and it's really, it's not just old on internet times, it's just old. So, um, and I look back at all the change we've been through, and the next 20 years are probably going to be even more accelerated.

AI assessment note: “What's not going to change is the core of Reddit, which is communities”