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The story
Reddit has revealed plans to require users to log in just to view content, not only to post. CEO Steve Huffman announced the move in a shareholder letter released on October 30, 2026 covering third-quarter results, saying the goal is to address declining traffic and to make it easier to understand who is using Reddit and for what purpose. On 5ch’s News Flash+ (Newsplus) thread, reactions split between suspicion that this is really about surveillance and the view that it’s aimed at sharpening ad targeting and blocking unauthorized AI scraping. Plenty of posters also compared the move to the anonymity and management style of their own 5ch.
The social platform Reddit has announced that going forward, content will only be viewable to logged-in users. The move to require login is meant to address declining traffic.
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In a shareholder letter on Reddit’s Q3 2026 earnings, released on October 30, 2026, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman revealed plans to shift Reddit into a login-required service.
Source: news.livedoor.com / Original article here
What people said
Right?
5ch criticizes absolutely everything until it just feels miserable.
You can really see that Japanese 'crab-bucket' mentality of dragging each other down.
Though plenty of those deletion mods are out of their minds too…
Probably because they want unique user logs to figure out the optimal ad targeting?
Honestly, I'm kind of looking forward to seeing what 5ch looks like in 20 to 25 years.
It gets fewer replies than a YouTube comment section anyway
Not much reason for it to even exist.
Basically: 'if you want to use it for training data, sign a contract and pay up.'
Before worrying about that, it'd be more useful if it exposed 5ch's actual real user count.
What censorship? This place runs unmanaged — specialty boards get trolled into a wasteland and they just leave it 😅
If this disappears as a source, AI answers are going to get narrower.
I'd crack up if 5ch got translated and turned into reading material over there.
I thought you already couldn't post without logging in in the first place.
Isn't the broken-Japanese stuff just auto-translation?
Dunno though.
It's still visible, man
It's not actually hidden.
so it can't be used for training.
AI: 'Want me to decontaminate it?'
I'm no expert either, but this kind of AI-driven internet collapse worries me.
Is it really fine to keep full-speed developing something as flawed as an undertrained AI?
If the internet collapses and that stalls AI progress too, that's probably a good thing.
If AI keeps evolving past this point, it's gonna get dangerous.
Hidden away in there are a few little hints for solving the problem.
I find myself endlessly fascinated by what kind of wonderful experience Reddit brings to people.
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I absolutely hate this phony, hollow-sounding translation.
Reddit translations have such a Murakami Haruki vibe a lot of the time, huh.
That'll make 5ch one of a kind, then.
Is 4chan registration-only too?
Background and Key Points of This Topic
Reddit’s policy shift follows the same trend as X (formerly Twitter)’s 2023 move to require login just to view content. Being able to see who’s reading makes ad targeting more precise, and it also makes it easier to block unauthorized AI crawlers from scraping content at the viewing stage itself. Reddit already has data-licensing agreements with companies like Google, so this move can be read as building a system where data only gets handed to partners with a legitimate contract. One point easy to miss in the thread: Reddit already required login to post — what’s newly being restricted is viewing. Reactions on 5ch split between those who see this as tightened surveillance of users and those who see it as a rational business call aimed at advertising and countering AI scraping, with plenty of posts comparing it to the management style of 5ch itself, an anonymous forum.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (News Flash+/Newsplus) thread “[Online Forums] Making It Easier to Understand ‘Who Is Using Reddit, and Why’ — Reddit Will Soon Require Login to Use.”
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