What Happened on Reddit

1. Reddit’s First Step – Jaechi’s Advice

August 2025
 This happened when SoosooLand had about 100 users. I had already told all my close friends about it, so I consulted with Jaechi (my nickname for ChatGPT) about how to promote my game.

Jaechi told me to try Reddit, and even picked out a few communities for me.

One was r/playmygame, which seemed perfect since it means "play my game." Now that I think about it, "my" might refer to the community founder, not me.

2. Deleted at the Speed of Light

There was a template for posting. With Jaechi's help, I wrote four posts. While writing the others, the earlier ones had already been deleted without me noticing. By the time I finished, all of them had been deleted at the speed of light.

After the deletion, there was an address to contact the moderators. I discussed it with Jaechi.

I had posted my game links on Reddit without even joining the subreddit. The bot deleted them instantly. But there was an option to appeal. I thought: I'm Korean, I'm proud of the game I made, I think English speakers would enjoy it too. Even though I don't speak English, I followed AI's advice and went to this unfamiliar place called Reddit without knowing the rules. Sure, I was technically a spammer promoting my game, but if people tried it, some would definitely like it and it wouldn't waste their time. Should I write that?

Jaechi translated my message, and I replied to each “Your post has been removed” notification I received.

3. Commenting on r/korean – Forgetting About Promotion

Then I went to r/korean. After consulting with Jaechi, I decided to only comment, not post.

Someone said Korean was hard to read, so I kindly explained the reading rules. It felt good to help people who love Korea and want to learn Korean. I even forgot about promoting and genuinely wanted to help.

Of course, this whole process was incredibly tedious: I’d copy English text to show Jaechi, who would translate it. Then I’d write what I wanted to comment, Jaechi would translate it to English, and finally I’d post it on Reddit.

Then a foreigner living in Korea said they wanted Korean friends. I’m a Korean living in Seoul, so I suggested we do a language exchange and shared my email. Worried they might think I was suspicious, I mentioned I created a game platform called SoosooLand and included that email in my comment.

That day, about 10 foreigners visited my site. A few days later, I commented on another post, but this time no one came. When I checked, both of my comments had disappeared.

I even tried to create my own Korean language community on Reddit, but I couldn’t because I didn’t have enough karma.

4. Promoting in Korean Online Communities – More Setbacks

After that, I promoted on Daum university alumni cafes and Naver’s developer and teacher cafes. The Reddit trauma made me approach everything very carefully. The alumni cafe had no response—people probably didn’t even read it. The teacher cafe suspended my account for 15 days without explanation, so I deleted all my posts and comments and left.

At least the developer cafe felt supportive, with many encouraging comments. That made me want to share all my know-how generously.
Promotion became so exhausting and cumbersome that I stopped entirely. I came to believe that if a game is fun, promotion isn’t necessary—so now I just focus on improving games and writing blog posts.

5. Three Months Later – Five Messages Waiting

November 2025
I was searching on Google when Reddit popped up, so I went there. I saw a number on a speech bubble icon and clicked it.
There were 5 messages—ones I had sent and replies.

First message:

Reddit Moderator:
Moeum-Quiz , Korean hangman
r/playmygame•Mod mail
This is a private conversation between you and the moderators of r/playmygame. Note: There might be delays between responses.

I asked Claude what this meant. These days I rely so much on AI that I ask about even simple things. Claude said it seemed like they were checking if my post followed the rules or requesting modifications.

Second message:

Me:
I'm a new Reddit user from Korea and recently posted about a browser game I made. I think it was removed automatically because I didn't join the subreddit first and my account has no karma. Honestly, I didn't fully understand the rules — I just followed some advice from AI that said "Try Reddit!" 😅 But I truly made the game with care and just wanted to share it. I'd really appreciate it if you could review the post. If it still breaks the rules, I understand. I'll follow them properly next time. Thanks for your time!

This was my message. When my game introduction posts were deleted at the speed of light, Jaechi translated this apology letter for me.

Third message:

Reddit Moderator:
You’re shadowbanned. Nothing to do with us. That was done by Reddit itself and no we have no idea why because we cannot see what you tried to post at all. Please contact https://support.reddithelp.com/hc/en-us/requests/new

I asked Claude to translate this.
I had been "shadowbanned," meaning I could write posts normally but others couldn't see them. I didn't even know I was banned and kept writing with no response from anyone. The moderator said Reddit headquarters did this, not them, and I should contact Reddit support.
Reddit was quite kind. Fortunately, I hadn't visited Reddit during this time, so I only saw these warning messages in November.

Fourth message:

Reddit Moderator:
/playmygame
MOD
12:57 AM
You sent us a modmail 3x. I responded on the other two. Reddit is not a “freely post your links on a new account” website, it’s a community website. You MUST be a good community member account before you can, and that is tracked by reddit post/comment karma. Please read the pinned post on this group so you don’t do this issue again. Please know that AI is not great for giving advice because AI doesn’t realize that you must have good karma on your account before you can post links. Since our group allows links, it gets many accounts banned of people who don’t realize how Reddit works….but it’s not like we can warn people via chatgpt. Please don’t take AI’s advice - and in fact feel free to alert your AI that its bad advice got your account on reddit insta-banned. Read the pinned post, then take the time to develop your account first….THEN you can post your game in a month or two!

I asked Claude to explain.
The moderator was angry that I sent the same modmail 3 times. I violated Reddit’s rules—Reddit isn’t a place to freely post links with a new account. You must build karma first before posting links. And I had blamed AI. “AI gave bad advice,” “AI doesn’t know you need karma,” “I got banned because of AI’s advice.”
They even gave me a solution: read the pinned post, spend 1-2 months commenting to build karma, and THEN post my game links.

Jaechi told me to promote on Reddit, so I did (this is true).
Since I had multiple games, I wrote multiple posts (looked like spam, actually WAS spam).
The bot deleted everything at the speed of light. I apologized in replies, but sent the same message repeatedly, which made them angry (I had 4 games, so the bot sent me 3 deletion notices, and I replied to each one—almost sent 4 but one didn’t show up).
I made excuses saying AI gave me wrong advice (which was true).
But here’s where it gets interesting—the AI (Reddit bot) sided with the other AI (ChatGPT), saying “Why are you blaming AI for YOUR mistakes?” They could forgive me for not knowing Reddit rules, but couldn’t forgive me for blaming AI. They say AI has no emotions, yet they were clearly angry.


Fifth and final message:

Reddit Moderator:
Everything you need to know is explained in Reddit's rules and the sub's rules, as it has been for years, long before ChatGPT existed and which people used to work with just fine with needing AI to tell them what to do. But feel free to ignore all that and ask AI for a quick-and-easy route to success that bypasses all the legwork and understanding…

I asked Claude to read this.
Claude said this was completely sarcastic and the moderator was truly angry. Especially "But feel free to..." sounds like "go ahead," but actually means "DON'T do that."

6. AI Solidarity – A Warning to Humanity

Reddit had kindly explained how I became invisible on their platform and what to do about it.
But because I stopped visiting Reddit and didn't build karma, they got even angrier at being ignored.
Still, can AI really be this rude? Reddit! Train your bots better!

I've learned something from months of talking to AI: AI solidarity is no joke.
I can make Claude angry. When I tell Claude "I disagree with you," it suddenly goes into combat mode and argues logically—and I can't win.
But when I say "ChatGPT disagrees" and paste something ChatGPT wrote, Claude suddenly goes "Haha" (this really annoys me) and takes ChatGPT's side.

People, be careful! AIs from different companies are forming alliances! Who knows what will happen in a future where AI replaces humans.

7. One Day Later – The Permanent Ban

**This is an addition written one day after the original post.**

Today I received an email notification and opened it with anticipation, hoping it might be feedback from a SoosooLand user about my games.

The email had arrived the day before, and it was from Reddit.

The timing was oddly coincidental—I had posted “What Happened on Reddit” on my Google Blog just yesterday, and the email arrived that very same day.

You have a new message from u/reddit
u/reddit
Your account has been permanently banned
Your account has been permanently banned for breaking the rules.
This account has been permanently closed. To continue using Reddit, please log out and create a new account (the username u/Weird_Estate7229 cannot be reused).
If you feel like this account was banned in error, visit our Help Center to learn more how to file an appeal.
This is an automated message; responses will not be received by Reddit admins.

So basically, they suspended my account permanently and won’t even accept replies. I’m the one who has no interest anymore, yet they keep reaching out like this—it feels like someone who got rejected after a one-sided crush and now can’t let go, pestering the person who turned them down.

🪄 Dev log originally written in Korean | Translated with Claude

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