A standoff between the site and some of its most devoted users exposes an existential dilemma.

  • div@kbin.social
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    137
    ·
    edit-2
    1 year ago

    “These people who are mad, they’re mad because they used to get something for free, and now it’s going to be not free. And that free comes at the expense of our other users and our business. That’s what this is about. It can’t be free.”

    Funny, seems like he has been getting all of it from content to moderation for free, and now he is the one angry it isn’t free any more…huh.

    • LiveLaughLoveRevenge@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      59
      ·
      1 year ago

      If they had charged API fees such that 3rd party apps would have had to charge a monthly fee to users…I would have probably just paid. And I know I’m not the only one.

      But they priced it intentionally to kill 3rd party apps, because they wanted to channel access through their garbage app with its “promoted” ads all over the place.

      It’s not about “free vs. not free” it’s about intentionally killing off the applications that made reddit likeable as a platform.

      • Singletona@kbin.social
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        10
        ·
        1 year ago

        Also, as a disabled internet user, those APIs are of value for the sake of accessability. Given Reddi’ts own app is, and forgive me to use technical jargon here, steaming pile of bullshit even for those with perfect vision?

        Yea fuck you too spez.

      • delcake@lemmy.songsforno.one
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        9
        ·
        1 year ago

        That’s why this whole debacle is so mystifying to me. If they would have tried to monetize the 3rd party space by way of charging a reasonable API price to the devs, it’s not hard to imagine that most serious Reddit users wouldn’t have any qualms with parting with a few bucks here and there to keep the status quo. I can’t imagine that Reddit is able to create a situation where they earn more from their advertising platform per user than having users simply pay to maintain the existing experience.

        The only theory I’ve heard that makes a lick of sense is that if Reddit fundamentally changes the site experience to pursue other monetization options (Hello Reddit NFTs), then 3rd party apps would’ve been able to just ignore implementing those features entirely.

        • bedrooms@kbin.social
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          5
          ·
          1 year ago

          My speculation is that they want to charge LLMs like ChatGPT, especially for training. Those devs basically want to access every conversation on Reddit.

            • bedrooms@kbin.social
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              5
              ·
              1 year ago

              What’s weird, it doesn’t make sense even then. I feel like it started as a simple miscalculation by Spez which he took personally. I mean, the part he insulted the Apollo dev is clearly that, but maybe the whole thing as well?

      • I_Miss_Daniel@kbin.social
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        5
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        I think there’s a little more to it. If they’re trying to go the Meta way where dwell times and other such evil metrics are used, they need to have their own app for that level of info. It might be a requirement for their IPO or requested by their advertisers.

      • nieceandtows@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        Even with the api fees, 3rd party apps are no longer allowed to show nsfw content. Would you still have paid a monthly fee?

    • Briongloid@aussie.zone
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      26
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      I had thought those where your words at first, you can quote like this;

      These people who are mad, they’re mad because they used to get something for free, and now it’s going to be not free. And that free comes at the expense of our other users and our business. That’s what this is about. It can’t be free.

      I’m struggling to show you what symbol it is without it turning into a quote, so here’s a picture of the greater than symbol;

      • FaceDeer@kbin.social
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        22
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        To display formatting characters without having them actually affect formatting, put a backslash in front of them. Like this:

        \>

        That produces this:

        >

      • div@kbin.social
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        5
        ·
        1 year ago

        Oh, nice! So I set the quote in between the greater then and less then symbols and it will show the quote? That is pretty cool. Thank you.

        • jennraeross@kbin.social
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          14
          ·
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          Not quite I think. I believe this uses markdown, which just uses the > at the beginning of a line

          > This is a quote

          should become

          This is a quote

          And if you need more lines, you just keep symboling

          > 1
          > 2
          > 3

          1
          2
          3

    • swope@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      23
      ·
      1 year ago

      Seems like a case for r/selfawarewolves … If that’s a thing that still exists.

    • Jojo-Mcfrost572@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      22
      ·
      1 year ago

      Nailed it.

      CEOs. Literally the worst. Toss up between “politicians” or CEOs. They take what they don’t produce and exploit it for their masters.

    • Kichae@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      20
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      But the ownership class always deserves to get things from regular people for free. It’s only those of us who make our living from our physical or mental labour, rather than owning property, that don’t deserve free shit.

      That’s just the hierarchy in action, doncha know.

    • Singletona@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      1 year ago

      Funny coming from a techbro that thought to farm out getting site content from that userbase he’s now wanting money from.

      Like I get it if he’s wanting to not go into debt, but at the same time he’s shot any chance at user good will and assistance in the face with a cluster fat man.

    • Jon-H558@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      1 year ago

      Yep mainly moderator’s.

      Also the thing we were getting for free (or paying for app) was a good service. If the Reddit app wasn’t crap when could have had that money. Many pay for premium to remove ads and still use these apps

    • sunbeam60@lemmy.one
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      1 year ago

      Yeah, the hubris is out of this world insanely unreal. Christ man, whoever that VP of Comms is at reddit is not doing a good job.