It's an instance that crossposts posts from Reddit, except it also makes a new user for each Reddit account it came from. So if /u/hello123 made a post, it makes that post under a new account called hello123. That makes it impossible to block posting bots.

Not only that, it makes posts look like they're posted by real people, with many question and text posts being copied as well. I was very confused as to what these posts were until I realized they're crossposts.

Examples:

https://alien.top/post/263029

https://lemm.ee/u/pocalyuko@alien.top

https://lemm.ee/u/ItzMeRocket@alien.top

https://lemm.ee/u/CaptainCapp-n@alien.top

I strongly believe Lemmy isn't the place for mirroring content from other websites. You can host your own alternate Reddit frontend like LibReddit, there's no reason to spam the posts to everyone using Lemmy just because 5 people asked for it. Not to mention there are already enough instances mirroring posts, this is getting obnoxious.

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[–] smeg@feddit.uk 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Wasn't reddit trying to claim that they own everyone's comments pretty universally decried? As in the reason half of us are here is because they decided they owned everyone's comments (so they could sell it to the AI trainers) and users said 'fuck off, it's my comment and I'll delete it'. There are plenty of reddit rehosters already, how is this different legally?

[–] MargotRobbie@lemmy.world 6 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Directly from Reddit's user agreement when you sign up for an account there.

You grant us a worldwide, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive, transferable, and sublicensable license to use, copy, modify, adapt, prepare derivative works of, distribute, store, perform, and display Your Content and any name, username, voice, or likeness provided in connection with Your Content in all media formats and channels now known or later developed anywhere in the world.

So like it or not, they have the rights to whatever you post there already.

There are plenty of reddit rehosters already, how is this different legally?

Because these were noninteractive front ends, none of them with a creator who is insane enough to publicly declares that they are scraping reddit to start a competitor and explicitly to harm reddit's financial interests.

[–] smeg@feddit.uk 4 points 11 months ago

Fair point, though just because you put something in an EULA that doesn't make it enforceable or even legal. Explicitly stating that you want to take down the company isn't going to do you any favours though.