Steve Huffman

Steve Huffman (born November 12, 1983) is an American web developer and the co-founder and current CEO of the content sharing website Reddit. More recently, he also participated in co-founding the airfare search-engine site Hipmunk.

• I don't think we should silence people just because their viewpoints are something we disagree with. There is value in the conversation, and we as a society need to confront these issues. This is an incredibly complex topic, and I'm sure our thinking will continue to evolve.
  • In July 2015 about of banning hate speech in Reddit. As quoted in Open racism and slurs are fine to post on Reddit, says CEO (12 April 2018) by Samuel Gibbs, The Guardian.

• Neither Alexis nor I created reddit to be a bastion of free speech, but rather as a place where open and honest discussion can happen: These are very complicated issues, and we are putting a lot of thought into it. It's something we've been thinking about for quite some time. We haven't had the tools to enforce policy, but now we're building those tools and reevaluating our policy.
  • In " Content Policy update. AMA Thursday, July 16th, 1pm pst." (archived), r/announcements (2015-07-16). Cited in "Was Reddit always about free speech? Yes, and no" (archived), Adi Robertson, The Verge (2015-06-25).

• I consider myself a troll at heart. Making people bristle, being a little outrageous in order to add some spice to life—I get that. I’ve done that.
  • The New Yorker: "Reddit and the Struggle to Detoxify the Internet" (19 March 2018)

• On Reddit, the way in which we think about speech is to separate behavior from beliefs, this means on Reddit there will be people with beliefs different from your own, sometimes extremely so. When users’ actions conflict with our content policies, we take action.
  • Responding to a question from a Reddit user about whether open racism and slurs are allowed on the platform. As quoted in Open racism and slurs are fine to post on Reddit, says CEO (12 April 2018) by Samuel Gibbs, The Guardian.

• Our approach to governance is that communities can set appropriate standards around language for themselves. Many communities have rules around speech that are more restrictive than our own, and we fully support those rules.
  • Responding to a question from a Reddit user about whether open racism and slurs are allowed on the platform. As quoted in Open racism and slurs are fine to post on Reddit, says CEO (12 April 2018) by Samuel Gibbs, The Guardian.

• Hate speech is difficult to define. There's a reason why it's not really done. additionally, we are not the thought police. It's not the role of a private company to decide what people can and cannot say.
  • As quoted in Conde Nast Sibling Reddit Says Banning Hate Speech Is Just Too Hard (9 July 2018) by Ashley Feinberg, HuffPost.
• You cannot build a product that appeals to a diverse set of people without having a diverse set of people designing the product.
  • Business Insider: "After a huge user revolt, nobody wanted to work at Reddit. 3 years later, the CEO explains how the 'front page of the internet' rebuilt the team." (9 September 2018)

• Reddit