Same. Thing is, I would usually get gold like once or twice a month. I would post well sourced, long and often highly upvoted comments. Try to be genuinely helpful or insightful. I used to be a journalist, it was an outlet for me.

Not that they were that great, redditers upvoting stuff doesn't make a comment right or interesting, and wasting too much time there was really not something to be proud of, but if just ten thousand users like you and me quit reddit, that leaves mainly teenagers, bots and 'comedians' rehashing the same tired puns.

It can effectively kill smaller subreddits, as has quite obviously happened in some cases.

We weren't just customers, we also produced a disproportionate amount of the content on reddit. More than our relatively small numbers would suggest. IRC the 1% rule states that only 1% of users actively post/comment. If you're posting relatively coherent or thought out comments, you're the 1% of that 1%.