Reddit has agreed to a $60 million deal allowing Google to utilize its posts for training AI models.
Reddit has struck a deal with Google that allows the search giant to use the chat site’s messages to train its artificial intelligence models and improve services such as Google Search.
The deal, announced Thursday, is valued at about $60 million and will give Reddit access to Google AI models to improve internal site search and other features. Reddit declined to comment or answer questions beyond a written statement about the deal.
The San Francisco-based company announced separately on Wednesday its plans to go public. In filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Reddit said it reported net income of $18.5 million, its first profit in two years, for the October-December quarter on revenue of $249.8 million. The company announced that it plans to list its shares on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol RDDT.
The Google deal is a big step for Reddit, which relies on volunteer moderators to organize a wide variety of free-wheeling topic-based discussions. These Moderators have publicly opposed previous Reddit decisions, most recently blacking out much of the site for days when Reddit announced plans to start charging many third-party apps to access its content.
According to a person familiar with the matter, the arrangement with Google does not foresee any data-driven changes to Reddit’s operations. This person requested anonymity to speak freely during the SEC-mandated “quiet period” that precedes an IPO. Unlike social media sites like TikTok, Facebook, and YouTube, Reddit doesn’t use algorithmic processes that try to guess what users are most interested in seeing next. Instead, users simply search for discussion forums that interest them and can then dive into ongoing discussions or start new ones.
The person also stated that the deal requires Google to follow Reddit’s terms of service and privacy policy, which also differ in some ways from other social media. For example, when Reddit users delete their posts or other content, the site removes it from everywhere without ghostly remnants lingering in unexpected places. Reddit partners like Google must do the same “to respect the choices users make on Reddit,” the person said.
The data-sharing arrangement is also very important to Google, which needs access to human-written material that it could use to train its AI models to improve their “understanding” of the world and thus their ability to provide relevant answers to questions in a conversational format.
Google praised Reddit in a press release, calling it “an incredible volume of authentic, human conversations and experiences” and emphasizing that the search giant’s primary goal is to “make it easier for people to benefit from useful information.”
Google downplayed its interest in using Reddit data to train its AI systems, instead emphasizing how it makes access to Reddit data like product recommendations and travel advice “even easier” by channeling it through Google products.
It described the process as “more of a content display of Reddit data,” intended to benefit both Google’s tools and make it easier to participate in Reddit.
