Was this a thing on the other side as well? What does it mean! Am I too old?
I had to look this up too after they started blowing up the feeds on every instance. https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=r%2F196
It appears to be a popular general meme community where everyone must post something, so there’s a lot of content.
It’s the posters stating that they’re posting to obey the rule of those communities. Something along the lines of having to post an image from your device if you end up browsing there.
I thought it was also in reference to a previous subreddit that I think was named 195, that had no rules but ended up being bigoted and such. So when 196 was made, a much more progressive/leftwing version, all they technically post are rules (hence the post titles) to further clown on that previous sub
My knowledge of reddit lore isn’t deep enough to dispute that but I just wanted to say that you have an excellent username.