The discussion is often very shallow, mostly aimed at "advanced beginners" because that's what appeals to the widest audience and anything else doesn't get traction, unlike in a traditional forum. This is very obvious if you're into a technical hobby like climbing or mountaineering.

Basically, if you don't fit the demographic / skill level mold, even niche subreddits (that aren't the dumpster fire that the large ones are) quickly lose their value.

In contrast, "I just bought X" typically is one megathread in a forum and not half the submissions.

However, I like trading (stocks and stuff) and the subs focusing on that are very... questionable at times. A ton of people that mistake pure luck for skill perhaps... every other day.

Its no use telling some of them that, yea you just made $1000 this week trading but if you don't test your strategies legitimately you could and will just as easily lose that $1000.

People really underestimate the randomness.

That's interesting, can you think of other examples besides climbing or mountaineering?

Don't get me wrong, great group of people in surveying- lots of stories about field work, current instruments, current products, etc - near zero interest (for the most part) in the deep technical aspects other than a certain passing "that's interesting | cool".

I'm not sure that's a strong criticism though, it's a social group, you can meet many people and occasionally bump into the few that actually write|develop instruments an software and then have all the off channel conversations you want.

My interest has been implementing numerics in no particular field; cartography, remote sensing, medical imaging, engineering modelling, financials, weddings, parties, anything, etc. I wander through a range of application areas and usually go deep on very dull specifics.

It's a common story - pick a domain area, there'll be a social group interested in that domain, with students, veterans, casual pass throughs, etc ; stories, yarns, classic photos etc are all popular but for the most part getting into the weeds on fine details will bore the pants off the bulk of that group.

Lots of people like to flex at the local climbing wall, few will ever bolt their way to the summit of Cerro Torre or cable ascend the Sydney Tower- this limits the discussion pools on portable generators and|or designing custom ascenders for cables and window washing tracks.

Each of these have non-Reddit counterparts where more serious discussion takes place

edit: I don't really get how my comment is any more sexist than saying it's only white men...

I'm not a Reddit user but a quick Google search confirms the ratio of males to females on Reddit is at least 2:1 and possibly 3:1.

There are also various other phenomena that suggest Reddit users of any gender or interest might see a disproportionate number of male posters, but we needn't go near those treacherous waters given the above numbers.

I think generality is more of a problem than size. The more general a subreddit's topic, usually the more of a cesspool it is.

The more specific and niche, the more likely it is to be focused, informative, and useful. Also the better moderated it tends to be, as the moderators are intensely interested in the topic and doing it as a labor of love.

All of the large subreddits are hot garbage. It's like Twitter intensified.

I would offer up the subreddit on liminal spaces or the video game Marathon as places for discussion that could not otherwise exist without Reddit.

Same here. For certain topics, I often get absolutely useless info on Google, but when I add site:reddit.com I suddenly get a lot of useful results.