I think they’re rolling it out rapidly at this point in time for the same reason that they’ve resisted it for years - it’s going to ‘force’ subs / mods to become more populist and more easily bent & manipulated by the whims of people “outside” the community, like reaching them via /all or similar.

No denying that Reddit has been ass as far as accountability and addressing problem moderators - but unless this mechanism is made super arcane black-box shit to prevent manipulation, this is very liable to result in tightly focused communities getting completely redirected.

Worse IMO is how much anything like a mod “election” is like grade-school Class President elections - it’s not about realistic campaign points, or about accomplishing meaningful things, it’s about popularity and talking hot shit, regardless of practical outcomes or larger implications. The kid who is gonna abolish detention, make recess four hours, and give our free gummy frogs every Tuesday is gonna win the vote - even if they can’t realistically make changes to the school and can’t afford candy for the class each week.

Just wait until spam rings start hijacking small subs via botnet mod votes.