Reddit’s CEO Loves Blockchain Avatars, But He Doesn’t Say “NFT”

My Reddit avatar couldn’t look like me if it tried. None of the hair options available can really match my receding hairline which combines a widow’s peak and an ebbing ocean tide. I’m just one of those internet users who don’t care that much about how I present on an internet forum.

Of course, other users care much more. Some people care so much about how they appear online that they will literally pay for it. Reddit recently introduced its own set of NFTs, available for purchase, all while trying not to use the term “NFT” anywhere in the original announcement. The company would later admit that these new avatars were actually tokens of the non-fungible variety, which opens up a whole can of worms about why the company made this choice and whether users are fully prepared for what they’re getting here.

Reddit tried to create its set of NFT avatars, called “CryptoSnoos,” as “simple” as that could, also make it easy to link their “MetaMask” wallet registration to a user’s account. The NFT avatars are linked to the Polygon blockchain and are stored and sold on the OpenSea NFT marketplace, which the forum company called “one of the best NFT auction platforms around.” Reddit takes 5% of each sale, of course.

Earlier this month, Reddit opened up a new campaign trying to get users to create a crypto wallet by giving out free NFTs to around 50,000 prolific users of the platform. The company eventually wants to hand out free avatars to 10 million users. It is difficult to assess the general perception of hundreds of millions of active usersbut Redditors haven’t organized backlash to the move on the scale of other communities that video players or tabletop role players.

Perhaps some of that is due to Reddit’s messages. In an interview with The Verge, Reddit co-founder and CEO Steve Huffman said he is against even using crypto terminology in any of these announcements. He said “it just confuses people.” Blockchain technology is opaque at the best of times. It combines the terminology of finance and technology, two industries known for their complexity in language.

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Based on the interview, Huffman is well aware of the problems in the crypto scene. He called much of the crypto stuff “extremely distasteful and counterproductive … parasitic and delusional.” He added that Reddit’s business model is not “let’s sell NFTs to crypto people to make a bunch of money,” but instead “put identity and reputation into a third-party database.”

In response to Gizmodo’s inquiry about what resources Reddit is providing to help users understand this push into blockchain, the company said “We’ve been very open and public about the project, explaining the technology along with our plans here and here. We have communicated transparently with users (here) about hosting and security.”

Yet, in none of these promotional offers posts are these avatars that have ever been referred to as NFTs. They refer to the avatars being “on the blockchain,” which requires a wallet. The company said “Having Collectible Avatars on the blockchain gives you – the buyer – ownership over your Avatar, wherever you want to take it, on or off Reddit.” However, this explanation does not reveal the true, complicated ins and outs of own related to NFTs. These non-fungible tokens act more like a digital receipt, not ownership the file itself. The complicated problems of trademarks and copyrights related to NFTs still being explored.

Avoid precise language in an attempt to clear up confusion, or perhaps because of the stigma Huffman admitted NFTs have, could end up being counterproductive in the long run, as users end up buying avatars without knowing what they’re getting or how they should ensuremaintain a crypto wallet.

The CEO said that a third of active Reddit users have created their own avatars since the company released theirs avatar builder for the platform. The company has done something else avatar campaigns with large IPs too, but the CEO said this emphasis on user-generated content — with this new focus on NFTs — is more in line with what it envisions for the forum. Huffman said this focus on identity allows users to “reveal your hobby without revealing your race … reveal something of your style without revealing your age or gender.”

So, Why is NFTs and blockchain technology are needed to this? Well, Huffman likes the idea of ​​artists, especially active Reddit users, selling avatars and allowing them to earn money from other users. He calls NFTs “closer to actual ownership” than other digital goods, since they are not tied to a single company. Keep in mind that such non-fungible tokens are largely tied to the blockchain platform itself and the centralized website where such tokens are listed.

This may prove to be a problem for Huffman’s proposed utopia. Previously OpenSea employees are charged with insider tradingall while the platform has routinely struggled to handle what is effective NFT plagiarism and fraud. Not to mention, there have been major heists at OpenSea through phishing attacks, allowing hackers to make off with $1.7 million in digital goods.

Meanwhile, the Polygon blockchain ecosystem has become one the main source of apps of all stripes across both the De-Fi scene and centralized blockchain ventures. It claims to be less harmful to the environment than other blockchains, although there are many holes in that argument. Digital economist wrote back in February as Polygon’s contracts on the Ethereum network do increase the overall carbon footprint of the blockchain.

Based on the interview, Huffman is highly critical of how blockchain technology has been used so far, and he doesn’t want to make any kind of overt claim to reinvent the wheel.

Reddit isn’t the only social platform to push NFT avatars into their existing systems. Twitter and Instagram allow NFT avatars, which of course cost a little extra to display. Snapchat considering allowing users to turn NFTs into filters. Twitter product manager Esther Crawford told The Wall Street Journal earlier this year “We want to support this growing interest among creators to use decentralized apps to manage virtual goods and currencies,” which is, of course, a load of jargon and nonsense.

Compared to other social platforms, Reddit tries to emphasize the user side of the equation with its focus on artists active on its forums. However, the problem with less emphasis on jargon is trying to increase ease of use is that it has the potential to mask the problems with systems like OpenSea that facilitate these trades. It is incredibly difficult to explain blockchain technology in any concise way, and comprehensive way, but omitting the specifics of this technology when it is introduced to users may not be the answer either.