How Reddit Became a Gun Market—and Authorized Its Logo on Assault Rifles

[Redfairen]

Since 2011, part of the popular online forum Reddit has grown into an active marketplace for assault rifles, high-capacity magazines, and other powerful firearms, according to an investigation by Mother Jones. In the last six months alone there have been more than 1,000 listings posted by more than 400 Redditors on the GunsForSale subreddit, one of thousands of niche communities on the sprawling discussion site. Not only has Reddit allowed a gun market to thrive, it has also literally put its stamp on it: Gun purchases brokered through the site have included nearly 100 AR-15s engraved with Reddit's alien logo, which was used on the assault rifles with explicit permission from the company—while it was owned by media giant Condé Nast—according to email correspondence obtained by Mother Jones.

In May 2011, a Redditor organizing a bulk order of AR-15s asked the company about a plan to engrave the logo and replace the standard "SAFE/FIRE" markings on the weapons' safety selectors with "UPVOTE/DOWNVOTE." Within a few days of the request, a Reddit business staffer working in the New York City headquarters of Condé Nast granted permission to use the logo in an email sent from a Condé Nast account. The staffer did note that for the safety selectors, "we would prefer that you keep the SAFE/FIRE language…to ensure the safety of all people who may come in contact with these guns."

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The Reddit-branded AR-15s represent just a sampling of the powerful firearms purchased through the site, which has tens of millions of users and often drives major traffic to other websites. Many listings have offered guns in quantity: In September, for example, an active seller and Redditor who goes by the handle "FirearmConcierge" advertised an inventory of black SCAR 16s, a combat assault rifle made for US Special Operations forces. "UPS freight just dropped 19 of them off," the listing read, pricing them at $2,300 a piece. According to his online postings, FirearmConcierge is a federally licensed firearms dealer (FFL) operating in Florida.

Instructions posted by the moderators of the GunsForSale subreddit warn users to comply with federal and state laws, and many sellers on the site say that they transfer guns through FFLs, which conduct background checks on buyers. But some user comments suggest that sellers may be exploiting a loophole in federal law to traffic firearms—including talk of licensed dealers selling guns without conducting background checks, which in some circumstances would be illegal.

At least 159 transactions have been completed on GunsForSale since last June, according to more than 100 Redditors who reported them using the subreddit's automated system for verifying sales and rating sellers. The number of completed transactions may be higher, because some deals arranged through private messaging on the site and completed face-to-face likely go unreported.


http://m.motherjones.com/politics/2014/01/reddit-guns-assault-rifle-ar15-logo-conde-nast