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Reddit Ramps Up Its Threats To Protesting Mods, As Ad Buyers Leave
(www.techdirt.com)
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
1999, Malda & Bates sold it to Andover.net. It didn't become terrible, but there was a sense that it went corporate. It's been sold and resold since then.
I guess I mostly used it after the sale, then. I started in 1998 or 1999 (when the hype for The Phantom Menace was building up) and used it until the early 2010s.