BOINC. If you’re a scientist, you can use it to distribute massive computational workloads for free. And there are tons of computing volunteers who will gladly do the computation for you. If you love science, it’s a great way to engage with some cutting edge research projects and know that you’re “doing my part!”. You can help research cancer, develop new open source drugs, map the galaxy, or just do some fun math stuff. Just install and pick your projects, no PhD required! There was even a projects for a while to reverse all the minecraft seeds that some people participated in. https://sopuli.xyz/c/boinc

It’s going to be bought anyways by speculative investors. The only difference is who buys it. The market has an as-of-yet-unknown price it will buy those shares at. Even in the scenario you describe where demand from redditors drives up the price, if the end goal is achieved of having a user-owned platform, I’d still consider it a win.