Reddit is the most active site in the news and microblogging community on the internet. They are trendsetters in so many ways. And they were one of the first sites that accepted cryptocurrencies for their “premium services.” But they have dropped this option in favor of PayPal and credit cards recently, allowing users to buy “coins” which are a kind of native token to the platform.

More Spice: Bitcoin Still Breathing in China: Court Uses WeChat to Rule Crypto is Property

Reddit and its Importance

Reddit is one of the most important portals on the internet. Its influence cannot be underestimated. On its pages, people express their thoughts and opinions about anything in particular. Its platform is such a powerful tool for spreading ideas among communities that people flock to it just for that.

This makes it extremely important for Reddit’s services to be available for most people in the world. Their gold service, a popular upgrade that brings premium features for the users, like ad-free navigation and access to a special lounge, is very popular among Redditors.

But earlier this year Reddit changed its payment policies and now this service is available only with the purchase of “coins,” tokens designed to be used in the same platform.

Reddit’s Payment Problem

The problem is that these tokens can only be acquired with PayPal and credit cards, leaving most of the unbanked out of the scope of Reddit Gold. According to a thread from seven months ago, it was a change in the Coinbase Commerce plugin that supposedly made them abandon the option of paying with bitcoin core (BTC). The same user declared that they would be evaluating demand in the coming months to re-enable payments.

Coincidentally that happened in a bear market, and after that BTC dropped more than 50% in its prices and also was dropped by other retailers like Steam and Microsoft. But these businesses have a more corporate approach to the market, and while Reddit is a business it is also a social site.

Reddit Gold, or Reddit Premium like it is called now, was a direct price subsidy from the users for the platform. So, restricting this payment to only credit cards and PayPal has made it impossible for users around the world to access to these premium services.

Reddit’s Cryptocurrency Group

What is more strange and ridiculous about this is that Alexis Ohanian, the co-founder of Reddit, is a very active bitcoin activist and has been optimistic about the use cases of cryptocurrencies since their inception.

More so, there is a strong cryptocurrency movement in the Reddit platform, hosting subreddits for most of the existent cryptocurrencies available out there. This “coin” initiative could have very well substituted with a cryptocurrency wallet inside the same microblogging site, with the possibility of making donations in-platform.

Of course that this last functionality is already available from third-party bots like Tippr for Bitcoin cash, but an official option would have been better. Being the site of the most active cryptocurrency community, it is odd that a cryptocurrency option for payments has been neglected for that same community.

In the end, users and the platform both lose, and there is no reason for not having cryptocurrency as a payment method listed, even with a payment processor, to support users from international countries where options listed now are not available.

CONTINUE THE SPICE and check out our piping hot YouTube channel. Our podcast, Milk, might help sooth that crypto burn. Follow CoinSpice on Twitter. Join our Telegram feed to make sure you never miss a post. Drop some BCH at the merch shop — we’ve got some spicy shirts for men and women. Don’t forget to help spread the word about CoinSpice on social media.