Google will be paying Reddit $60 million a year as part of a plan in which the social media platform’s content will be used to train the search giant’s artificial intelligence models, according to a new report from Reuters, which says that it learned of the deal from three different sources. The news follows a report from Bloomberg last week about how Reddit had signed an AI content licensing deal ahead of its IPO, but it wasn’t clear what that company was at the time.
Reuters reports:
- “Social media platform Reddit has struck a deal with Google to make its content available for training the search engine giant’s artificial intelligence models…”
- “The contract with Alphabet-owned Google is worth about $60 million per year, according to one of the sources.”
- “Reddit, which is preparing for a high-profile stock market launch, is seeking to generate new revenue…from the likes of TikTok and Meta…”
Reuters noted:
Last year, Reddit said it would charge companies for access to its application programming interface (API) – the means by which it distributes its content. The agreement with Google is its first reported deal with a big AI company.
Critics are saying:
- “lol AI is going to get real dumb real fast.”
- “Why don’t they just get the Data from the bot-writers directly? Would cover 98% of reddits content.”
- “that’s pocket change for Google— you’re getting hosed, Reddit”
- “If a deal like this goes through, remember any creative work you put on here can then be used legally in any future AI content created by Google. This is kinda crazy…”
- “Considering how much Reddit content is AI generated spam, this is going to get hilarious.”
Bloomberg previously reported:
The San Francisco-based firm told prospective investors in its IPO that it had signed the deal, worth about $60 million on an annualized basis, earlier this year, the people said. Reddit’s agreement with an unnamed large AI company could be a model for future contracts of a similar nature, one of the people said.
Discussion (11 replies)
Join Discussion →Kinda makes me glad I don't do anything over at Reddit.
Would kinda suck to hear they just got a fat paycheck off the content you created, and you get .. to pay for third party tools now.
Redditt is a bit of a cesspool.
Their karma system sucks for out of favor opinions.
I did a comment ( with my fresh account) on a ufo subreddit, got downvoted ( wasn't even malicious or that confrontational, just my opinion on some post) from then on anything I would post everywhere would be not visible ( you'd have to click on it) and I am sure any new posts I made wouldn't get really shown ever, even in like a defect coin subreddit, I got zero responses, for a pretty cool defect with pictures. The downvotes screwed up my profile, made me into basically a reader only.
It sucks, I gave up on it. Meh.
Not sure training AI on it is a particularly good idea, most people are bot like already due to their karma system most likely.
Nothing better than training AI on unverified user generated data, what's the worst that could happen? Creating an ultra racist AI? I'm surprised gemini didn't outright call for the final solution against white people. And guess how the media is spinning it? The erasure of white people was racist against people of color!
That's true for any large enough public forum. The popular opinion will drown out any minority report making it into a circle jerk of dudebros patting each other in the back for sharing an opinion with half of the world. And you get zero redemption for being proven right a few months later.
I check Reddit out somewhat regularly but primarily just the PCmr forum. It's a mostly friendly place but I don't get too deep into it either. However, I'm none too thrilled about this deal either as the amount of misinformation an AI could be trained on from there is almost incalculable. I am curious though, if the user fine print mentions anything about your data being eligible to be mined.
I admit though, I haven't tried posting anything there either so I haven't had to deal with the BS others have but have heard similar stories from others.
I usually only stumble upon reddit if I'm looking up something PC related when searching an issue or opinion.
Man... I'm seriously tempted to buy a few shares of RDDT when they IPO. not sure if I want to jump in at the strike price you just know the gamestop boyz will be going all in. ;)
Redditt stock should be worthless, but it will probably be made into a 6 trillion dollar company cause reasons.
I think it will see a IPO boom then level out then just plummet when all of the companies that want contracts to collect data realize they are paying for poorly written factually inaccurate bullshit.
Shouldn't each user have a say regarding whether or not their content is used?
Someone should sue them.
Yeah their say happens in the EULA i guess.