Reddit to Draw Curtains on Crypto Based ‘Community Points’ Programme, Blames Stability Concerns

Reddit has informed its users that its Community Points programme will be coming to an end on November 8.

Written by Radhika Parashar, Edited by Siddharth Suvarna | Updated: 18 October 2023 17:27 IST

Reddit to Draw Curtains on Crypto Based ‘Community Points’ Programme, Blames Stability Concerns

Photo Credit: Reuters

Reddit launched this Community Points feature in 2020

Highlights

Reddit’s crypto tokens MOON and BRICK have declined
Reddit community is disappointed with the decision
Some believe Reddit may have rugged MOON, BRICK investors

Reddit has decided to shut down its ‘Community Points' initiative that it launched for its crypto-friendly users back in 2020. Citing stability concerns, the feature let Reddit users earn Ethereum rewards based on the up votes they got on contributing to a subreddit with insightful content or by volunteering to moderate the community. In an official announcement released on October 17, the social networking platform informed its users that its Community Points programme will be coming to an end on November 8.

“Part of why we're winding down Community Points is because we're able to scale several products that accomplish what the Community Points program was trying to accomplish, while being easier to adopt and understand. Though we saw some future opportunities for Community Points, there was no path to scale it broadly across the platform,” said Reddit's official post.

The Ethereum-based ERC-20 tokens, that were rewarded to eligible Redditors, were extracted from the ‘Reddit Vault', which is the platform's own crypto wallet service.

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Reddit's crypto tokens MOON and BRICK have seen a sharp price decline since the news of community points being withdrawn broke on its blog. Meanwhile, a debate has started on X concerning Reddit's decision among community members.

While some people on X are claiming that Reddit may have ‘rugged' the investors of MOON and BRICK with this move, others are defending the platform saying that it makes sense for it to shut down features that are not performing as expected.

What the fuck, Reddit (yes actually the company Reddit) just rugged their users by "discontinuing" their native cryptocurrency.

-90% just like that. pic.twitter.com/lzuqs1KNsX
— Byzantine General (@ByzGeneral) October 17, 2023

"you can't just discontinue it - we paid hundreds of dollars to stack it in the hopes of financial gain"

reddit: pic.twitter.com/p5VWe21tQk
— arf.eth (@arfdoteth) October 17, 2023

So, in general, if a company starts a feature they should continue till eternity?
— Pratik (@Pratik_in_Web3) October 17, 2023

Reddit, as of now, has not addressed these claims.

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“We still love the idea that inspired Community Points. Specifically, finding better ways to improve community governance and empower communities and contributions. Though the moderators and communities that supported Community Points have been incredible partners - as it's evolved, the product is no longer set up to scale,” its announcement noted.

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Further reading: Cryptocurrency, reddit

Radhika Parashar

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Radhika Parashar is a senior correspondent for Gadgets 360. She has been reporting on tech and telecom for the last three years now and will be focussing on writing about all things crypto. Besides this, she is a major sitcom nerd and often replies in Chandler Bing and Michael Scott references. For tips or queries you could reach out to her at RadhikaP@ndtv.com. More