Minecraft Dev Team No Longer Posting Official Updates on Reddit
If you're a Minecraft fan and you follow official updates from the Minecraft dev team, you better not look on Reddit, because the team says it’s no longer posting official content there. The news comes in response to recent changes by Reddit and a crackdown on protests over those changes by subbers, and it’s going to have a big impact on Minecraft players.
The news comes from a post from a Reddit user named sliced_lime, who is believed to be the Minecraft Java Tech Lead and is a prolific commenter on Minecraft threads. According to their post history, they have posted on one Minecraft thread, and it happens to be this one, with the title ‘Reddit is no longer a viable option for official communication.'
“We are no longer posting official content on Reddit,” they write. “This decision comes in response to Reddit’s recent changes and crackdown on protests over changes to its API. As a result, we no longer feel that Reddit is an appropriate platform for posting official content or referring players to. Instead, we will be directing players to our official social media accounts, or our feedback site.
“This is not a decision that we took lightly. We spent years posting official changelogs in the Minecraft subreddit, but recent changes by the site’s leadership have caused us to reconsider. Subreddit mods have been mounting campaigns against Reddit’s corporate leadership, leading to private communities, and NSFW markings on subreddits such as /r/gaming.”
The departure of Mojang from the Minecraft subreddit means the end of official changelog threads, where fans can offer feedback directly to the devs. Now, players are welcome to post unofficial update threads, and they can provide feedback through Mojang’s feedback site or social media.
User reaction has been mostly understanding. One top-voted comment says, “Understandable,” and asks where else players can access official changelogs. Other comments express anger towards Reddit’s leadership.
Minecraft’s decision to cut off Reddit as an official port of call is significant for a game of its size and importance. It’s reminiscent of advertisers leaving Twitter after Elon Musk’s assumption of leadership, and it remains to be seen if Reddit’s leadership will take notice of this decision. We’ve contacted Microsoft to see if other studios will follow Mojang’s lead in cutting off Reddit as a source of official communication.
The author concludes by saying that they will update the piece if they receive any response from Microsoft or other studios. There is no indication of any other Microsoft studio taking similar action at this time. The author speculates that if Microsoft were to take action against Reddit, it would be a significant event.
