By "gamification" I mean "you get points for behavior." This is true of every subreddit and every account. Reddit makes a lot more sense when you realize that a moderator's ability to influence a subreddit is the same as an individual user's ability to influence a subreddit... plus CSS and scripting. Combine that with the fact that their hires make piss-poor money and deal with a wretched internal communications culture and you soon realize that even the "admins" have little control over the process.
I haven't heard about this specifically, but it would certainly explain a lot. But I have noticed how awful the admins are at communicating with users. They have one of the most skeptical userbases around (or maybe better said is big enough to still have lots of skeptical people), yet they still act like bland corporate press releases are going to satisfy those users. Invariable people call them on their nonsense (and these get pushed to the top), so it becomes a shitshow. Honestly I don't think they know what to do with what they have better than anyone else. their hires make piss-poor money and deal with a wretched internal communications culture and you soon realize that even the "admins" have little control over the process.