The next attention-grabbing post you see in your Reddit feed might just be a paid 'free-form ad'.

Calling them “free-form ads,” Reddit said the new advertisements are its most native format ever, designed to look and feel like community content shared by real people.

The ads, meant to mimic the site’s megathreads, will enable advertisers to utilize a variety of formats in one post, including images, videos, and text.

According to numbers from Reddit, free-form ads got 28% more clicks than all other types of ads on the site and saw a jump in community engagement.

The next time you see an interesting post in your Reddit feed, take a closer look - because it might just be a paid advertisement.

  • @watersnipje@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    22•2 months ago

    Yeah I remember a few years ago when there was suddenly some sort of hype around Nutella and Nutella-based memes. Which just so happened to coincide with a major Nutella advertising campaign on other platforms.
    People were eating it up and generating content, essentially doing an advertiser’s work for free 🤷‍♀️

    • @Test_Tickles@lemmynsfw.comEnglish
      0•2 months ago

      They are getting more subtle. Ever notice how actors suddenly rise to the top? Posts about how awesome they are, or how great things they have done are? Right before I left Reddit it was awash with Pedro Pascal and how amazing and humble and down to earth he was, then the new mandalorian came out and after a few weeks, no one gave a fuck about our new god.
      I remember I first noticed it years ago when there was this sudden craze for Bradley Cooper, and how he spoke French (really broken, highschool level French). And everyone was amazed at it like speaking a second language made him amazing. It felt really weird and condescending how much praise he was getting for being willing to not only speak to these “lowly foreigners” in “their crazy language”, but also to bother to learn it in the first place. And all I could think was “you’re talking about French right? An optional language that’s taught and the vast majority of high schools across the US?” I mean good on him and great job, but wtf? And then suddenly silence… Bradley who?