When I built reddit's mobile website, I refused to add any mobile ads - I told the product owner that they could buy ads like anyone else. Literally the week after I quit, they added in mobile ads. lol

At some point recently they changed it to ask you every time you visit. There used to be an option to disable the mobile app ads. Funny that that's the only thing they've changed in six years (I left late 2016.)

There's an ever present orange button. There's the first visit pop up, there's the hey you're looking at something NSFW try the app (why??) pop up and so on.. It's a wonderful experience.

What's the difference between mobile ads and ads like everyone else? Why didn't you want to add mobile ads?

I believe they're saying that they were asked to add ads specifically for the mobile app. Their stance was that if the team for the mobile app wanted the app advertised, they could just buy any of the regular ad slots on the website.

The idea is that "try the Reddit app" is an advertisement and so belongs in the advertising system (as a house ad) instead of as a special-cased popup.

Yup, this. I see how my statement was ambiguous.

An ad telling people to download the Official Reddit Mobile App. I imagine that's what they are referring to.

Mobile ads are naggy popups, while regular ones feel like just another post.

I am pretty sure he means ads from the mobile app division of reddit for free.

Which person, or people, is responsible for the direction Reddit has taken in terms of increasing user hostility to drive growth metrics? I am wondering if they have a track record for this sort of crap, in previous companies.

Yea I got tired of that and switched to their app and it is horrific. I quickly deleted it and went back to site surfing. Maybe they can IPO with such a garbage app but why not fix it first?

They're user hostile in general. old.reddit.com also naggs you to go to the new version, just so you can accept cookies, every few days.

Respect my preference, or don't offer the better UI at all if you want to punish me for it, or needle me out of using it.

Best to use i.reddit.com on mobile. The default mobile website is just unusable on my phone with the way it handles comments.