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Do You Think There Would Have Been a Large Protest if Steve Huffman Just Said We're Charging to Use the API to Increase Revenue? (beehaw.org)

submitted 2 years ago by curt@beehaw.org to c/technology@beehaw.org

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I've been a long time Redditor and an Apollo user for about a year. I even paid for it. The main draw for me was the lack of advertising. In the back of my head I kept thinking that it couldn't last. Reddit is losing revenue from the lack of advertising views. It didn't

To me, Reddit's sky high pricing for the use of the API is intended to kill off apps like Apollo and for its users to move to the advertising filled web site or its own app, which I've never used.

If Huffman came out and said this was a revenue move right off would everyone be as upset as they are? Are people upset because Huffman completely mishandled the move or because they got their ad free experience turned off? If Reddit had an app the same quality as Apollo only with ads, would they be OK with it. I've only used Apollo so I can't speak to the other apps.

I can't blame Reddit for wanting to make money. It doesn't make a profit. Investors have to keep pouring in money to keep it going. They're going to want to see a return on their investment at some point. Usually they cash in on an IPO, but IPO's are generally only successful if the corporation looks like it will be profitable or at least the stock price continues to go up. That's how capitalism works.

In my case, I probably would have left regardless. I can't stand adds in my feed. I probably wouldn't have heard of lemmy or kbin if there hadn't been such an uproar. So I'm glad it went the way it did.

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[–] kraiden@lemmy.nz 1 points 2 years ago (2 children)

The thing that I've seen pretty consistently from both RIF and Apollo devs is that they're not disputing the fact that reddit needs to start making a profit. Nobody's (seriously) complaining about what was free becoming not free.

The fact is, if this was purely about money, they'd be willing to negotiate on price. The price they're asking is ~70x more than imgur, which hosts images WAAAAAY heavier to host than text, and links etc.

If it was solely about showing ads, they could have given 3PAs access to reddit ads via the api, and enforced showing them.

There are several ways this could have worked for everyone.

Reddit wanted to kill 3PAs. That's the only logical conclusion here. Hell, if they'd come out and said THAT, as well as fixing the problems with their own app first, I might even have been able see their side of it. I would still be pissed, but it'd be more understandable than this very blatant Twitter-esque death-by-pricing thing they're trying to do.

[–] Zagorath@aussie.zone 1 points 2 years ago

The reports were that the amount they are asking 3PAs to pay is 29× the revenue that they would make from a user in advertising. Astonishing.

But I agree. If they had started this out simply by saying "no more 3PAs except for approved accessibility-focused apps", the protest would never have been able to get the steam it did. That statement would have cut the legs out of the accessibility-focused concerns (even though it doesn't actually adequately address VI users' needs). It would have removed the possibility for the huge drama that happened with their awful communication with and lies to 3PA devs. It would have completely mitigated bot devs' concerns. And it would have made the NSFW issues completely moot. With those issues addressed, there would have been nothing for the protests to really hook on to in quite the same way.

[–] progandy@feddit.de 1 points 2 years ago

The price they’re asking is ~70x more than imgur, which hosts images WAAAAAY heavier to host than text, and links etc.

The apollo dev got a very discounted price for the imgur api. Still, general imgur prices are about 3-4 times cheaper than the amount reddit is asking for now. That is if you stay in your quota. Exceeding the imgur quota costs about $1 per 1000 read requests, though. The value talked about for reddit is a flat rate of $.24/1000 or ~$1/3000 requests, no discounted plans are known to me.

The fact is, if this was purely about money, they’d be willing to negotiate on price.

That still holds true, though.