Everything is done via modmail. Users report posts/comments, and the reports go into a queue that basically says “this comment has been reported due to X”. As a mod, you go into the queue, review the content, and decide what to do. Very occasionally, you’d look at the new posts, but very few people did this, because reports would usually come into modmail within minutes. In terms of “power”, all that was different from being a normal user was some extra buttons, and modmail.

Often we’d be called out for banning people, or deleting things. This was almost always the admins, because I assume people had broken rules that had incurred their wrath, or they had been caught with duplicate/spam profiles to get around bans. We got a lot of shit for one ban…which was the kid that got in trouble with the police for stalking a mod at their place of work.

There were about 15 of us, and we were told to basically do as much or as little as possible. All the rules were community driven, so users got a say in what rules to add (don’t accept this source, no compilations, no news from years ago to confuse people, etc).

Sadly, with such a popular sub, a post that clearly breaks rules might get 300-500 upvotes before it’s removed, and you get the typical “but everyone likes this post, why remove it?!”. In my experience, users don’t care if it breaks the rules, until they care it breaks the rules. There is no winning when you’re a mod.

I did it because I used the sub for a decade, and wanted to give back while.i had been laid-off from work (COVID times). I definitely don’t regret it, and if Reddit weren’t so shit I’d do it again.