I’ve finally figured out reddit, and it’s a great tool for academics. You should really give it a try.

Over the past few years I’ve dabbled in reddit, failing to really ‘get it’. I thought it was just a place for silly GIFs and celebrity AMAs (Ask Me Anything), but I was wrong. It’s a place to share links to interesting internet stuff, but more importantly it’s a place where these links can be discussed. So if like me you’ve tried it before and failed to grasp it, or if you fancy giving it a go, here’s my suggested route in.

1. Read this.
2. Sign-up. Choose a username. You can remain anonymous if you wish.
3. Go to reddit.com/subreddits and unsubscribe from any stupid subreddits to which you’ve been automatically subscribed.
4. Go and find some subreddits to join. For academics I suggest academicpublishing, DepthHub and Scholar. And if you’re a fellow health economist, try academiceconomics, Economics, healthcare and HealthEconomics.
5. Have a look at your homepage. By this stage it should be full of articles that interest you. Follow the links. Vote-up the ones you like. Join the discussion by commenting on them.
6. Take a look at your preferences. They can alter the experience somewhat.
7. Head over to metareddit.com to find more subreddits you might like.
8. If you use Chrome, download the reddit companion.
9. Start submitting your own links and comments to subreddits and watch the discussion unfold. You can submit links to academic papers, blogs, silly pictures… whatever you like!

A word of warning. DO NOT use reddit exclusively as a means of self-promotion. You will be Shadow Banned, as I have been. Stick to the rule of thumb of no more than 1 in 10 of your link submissions being some way self-promotional. The number of links you can submit is, in some secretive way, defined by your ‘karma’. You get karma by posting links and comments that other people like. Just be helpful and nice and you won’t fall foul of the reddiquette police.