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Alexis Ohanian said he doesn't miss Reddit.Amal Alhasan/Getty Images for Fortune MediaReddit's cofounder, Alexis Ohanian, said he does not miss being in leadership at the company.He conducted an "Ask Me Anything" on Reddit, where a user asked him whether he missed the platform.Ohanian is partnering with entrepreneur Kevin Rose to relaunch Reddit's old rival, Digg.Reddit's cofounder doesn't miss working at the company he started more than 20 years ago.Alexis Ohanian, who left Reddit's board five years ago, conducted an "Ask Me Anything" on the platform on Monday to promote the relaunch of the old Reddit rival, Digg.A Reddit user asked Ohanian, "Do you miss anything about being in leadership at Reddit?"His answer was curt: "I do not."Ohanian stepped down from Reddit's board of directors in June 2020 following the killing of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis. At the time, he wrote on Reddit that it was a "long overdue" move to "do the right thing."He urged the Reddit board to fill his seat with a black candidate, after the company had been criticized for providing a platform for racist and hate speech.Ohanian said in the AMA on Monday that he left Reddit "to pressure the company to make policy changes like banning racist/hate communities."Digg is a Reddit-like forum page founded in 2004 by entrepreneurs Kevin Rose and Jay Adelson.In 2008, Google floated a deal to buy the platform for $180 million, which did not come to fruition. Venture capital fund Betaworks bought it in 2012 for $500,000.But last year, TechCrunch reported that Rose had reacquired the platform, joined by Ohanian.Ohanian said on his AMA that Digg will be a community-first platform, with a transparent algorithm "based on what you actually follow."He also promised not to feed Digg's users with "AI-driven enshittification.""We are not using AI to rank content, shape discourse, personalize feeds, or decide what you should see," he said. "There is no black box recommendation engine optimizing for engagement. Our feed logic is simple, published, and human readable."Read the original article on Business Insider

Sam AltmanBENJAMIN LEGENDRE/AFP via Getty ImagesAdvertising could be a $25 billion business for OpenAI by 2030, Evercore ISI's Mark Mahaney wrote.OpenAI said Friday that it will start testing ads for some ChatGPT users.A big ads business at OpenAI could present a challenge to Google's search business.Advertising could become a $25 billion business for OpenAI — and pose a threat to Google, according to new estimates on Monday from a top tech analyst.Evercore ISI's Mark Mahaney sees the startup generating that level of annual ad revenue by 2030 if it executes well on rolling out this new business.OpenAI said on Friday that free and Go users of ChatGPT would start seeing ads "in the coming weeks." OpenAI also laid out its advertising principles, such as clearly labeling them and not sharing user conversations with advertisers."A path to generating several billion dollars in ad revenue in 2026, going to $25B+ by 2030, seems reasonable," Mahaney wrote in a note to investors.That's based on the likely scale of ChatGPT by that time, the proven monetization of high-intent performance marketing platforms, and the current size of this market, the analyst added.OpenAI's revenue is growing fast already. CFO Sarah Friar said in a recent blog post that the startup's annualized revenue topped $20 billion in 2025, up from $2 billion in 2023. However, there are big question marks over OpenAI's losses and whether it can become profitable in the future.Advertising could be one way for OpenAI to boost its top and bottom lines.Mahaney noted that Google's Search and YouTube businesses likely generated close to $300 billion in ad revenue in 2025, with Meta generating an additional $180 billion. These are highly profitable operations, with operating profit margins of 40%, according to the analyst.ChatGPT has almost 1 billion weekly average users, many of whom share valuable details with the chatbot, such as what they want and need. Advertisers are willing to pay up for access to this treasure trove. This is the type of intent-based information that forms the backbone of the massive digital ad businesses run by Google and Meta.OpenAI has said that initial test ads will appear at the bottom of ChatGPT answers and be relevant to the user's conversation with the chatbot. That approach might not be too intrusive for users, while still being attractive to advertisers, Mahaney said."OpenAI's move directly challenges this core revenue stream by offering an alternative, highly engaging platform for users to discover products and services," Mahaney wrote. "If ChatGPT can successfully integrate ads that are helpful rather than intrusive, it could siphon off valuable commercial queries that traditionally go to Google."The analyst also warned that if OpenAI can develop a "conversational" ad format, where users research and discuss potential purchases within ChatGPT, that could prompt advertisers to shift some of their marketing budgets because this is "high-intent engagement."Even if ChatGPT goes all-in on ads, though, don't expect the chatbot to take Google's share of the market overnight, Mahaney added.OpenAI will still have to compete with the tech ecosystem that Google has spent years creating, such as its Chrome web browser, as well as web users' habit of Googling stuff when they need an answer, Mahaney wrote.Read the original article on Business Insider