The Mod Helper Program is a tiered system that awards helpful moderators with trophies and flairs. Reddit users accrue karma by receiving upvotes and awards, and lose karma if they receive downvotes. The program rewards moderators who receive upvotes on comments in r/ModSupport.
Comment karma earned in r/ModSupport will be rewarded with trophies that will “signal to other mods that you are a source of valuable information,” the moderator support team announced on Thursday. Each rank awards unique trophies and flairs, ranging from “Helper” to “Expert Helper.” Reddit launched a similar program in r/help earlier this year, which rewards users who accrue karma by responding to other users’ requests.
Reddit also launched the Modmail Answer Bot, which automatically responds with relevant links to the site’s Help Center. If the recommended articles don’t answer a specific request, it will create a ticket that will be handled by a human admin. The bot is designed to streamline moderator requests so the admin team can focus on more complex issues.
Additionally, Reddit is merging the moderator-specific Help Center with its sitewide one to ensure that support resources are “easy to find and accessible from the same location.”
In the most upvoted comment replying to the announcement, Reddit user MapleSurpy expressed frustration over the lack of useful moderation features available on Reddit’s official app. Moderators have requested ban evasion tools and “actual help from admins” when dealing with “problem users,” MapleSurpy said.
“We’ve asked for better tools on the official app to run subs now that Reddit took away every single third-party one,” they said. “What did we get? Another automated system … and flair rewards. Thank you SO much, I’m sure this will solve a whopping zero problems.”
Another user pointed out that the flairs aren’t based on comments that are actually helpful, and that “snarky people who are funny” will reach “expert in no time.”
I was top mod of a 25K sub that closely followed an IRL lolcow trying to become a public intellectual. It was thankless, the monthly user tempests in a teapot were annoying, and dealing with the occasional new junior mod turning out to be a chud was taxing. I did it for maybe six months and then peaced out.
I honestly don’t understand the psychological makeup and social model of the big top mods who do this shit, day in day out, year after year. I assume they’ve got to be making money somehow, or they maybe are bubble-boys.
Probably just fools. Working for a corporation that makes money from your work without sharing any of it with them. Nobody should be moderating on Reddit without getting paid.
sociopath turbo nerds. it’s not emotionally taxing for them whatsoever