Reddit Distances Itself From Imgur With Its Own Photo Tool

Reddit has announced that it will be rolling out its own image-uploading and -hosting service to select communities, thus stepping away from its informal but integral relationship with Imgur. According to the /r/changelog post:

“Other image hosting services have been an integral part of how content is shared on Reddit — we’re grateful to those teams, but are looking forward to bringing you a more seamless experience with this new feature.”

According to the same moderator, the new service will be rolled out in beta across the following subreddits: GetMotivated, EarthPorn, Gaming, Space, OldSchoolCool, Sports, Art, Aww, Dataisbeautiful, Food, Funny, Gifs, mildlyinteresting, movies, photoshopbattles, pics.

Imgur was originally started by a member of the Reddit community who was frustrated with the image-hosting sites of the time and sought to improve on user experience and interface. What started as a donation-based project has since bloomed into a booming community of creators and commenters intrinsically connected to Reddit—so much so that Imgur has catapulted into the list of the Internet’s Top 50 most-visited sites at the time of this article’s writing.

The monetization of this community and its growing audience, however, means that Reddit’s relationship with Imgur has shifted away from one of co-operation toward one of direct competition: Reddit’s move to an in-house content production and hosting tool diverts traffic away from Imgur; in theory, users will use Reddit’s new photo tools, foregoing Imgur altogether, and potentially creating more ad revenue for the self-proclaimed “Front Page of the Internet.”

Imgur responded coolly, telling TechCrunch: “This isn’t a surprise. Tools for uploading images are an expected part of any platform these days. That said, nothing will change for Reddit users who would like to use Imgur to share their images on Reddit.”

It’ll be interesting to see how this update will affect the relationship between the two websites going forward. This marks the latest in Reddit’s consolidation efforts, after the company released its own standalone iOS app, effectively replacing fan-favorite Alien Blue. If the past few news stories are to be believed, the popular message-board site seems to be moving toward a consolidated Web presence that relies less on a community of orbiting sites, and more on keeping users on the Reddit homepage for as long as possible.