Mastodawn

ojizero Jun 3, 2023

Reddit had a no good, very bad week. Reversing on its 15-year support of 3rd party apps, new API pricing makes using anything other than the official app financially unviable. And with just 30-days before changes take effect, indie devs are on the hook for potentially millions of dollars of unexpected costs and/or App Store refunds. I talked with @christianselig about how it has affected Apollo, the best iOS Reddit client out there.

https://youtu.be/Ypwgu1BpaO0

How Reddit Became the Enemy - w/ Apollo Developer Christian Selig

YouTube

Amy ➡️ 38c3 2748 Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq wait the changes go live in 30 days?? I thought it was just a proposal for now.

Quinn Nelson Jun 3, 2023

@anamy Nope. July 1.

Amy ➡️ 38c3 2748 Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq that sucks hard, Apollo was the only reason I could use Reddit.

@huggydude🇺🇦Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig Is there a alternative to Reddit at this point worth joining up with? I would love a decentralized version of Reddit or something similar.

Gracjan Nowak Jun 3, 2023

@huggydude @huggydude @snazzyq @christianselig https://ieji.de/@gracjan/110464476750971194

Gracjan Nowak (@[email protected])

@[email protected] @[email protected] There’s a #Reddit alternative that’s a part of the #Fediverse (just how Mastodon is). It’s called #Lemmy. Maybe people can move to that. 🤔 https://join-lemmy.org

ieji.de

jennraeross 🏳️‍⚧️Jun 3, 2023

@huggydude @snazzyq @christianselig

http://www.tildes.net Is the closest thing I've found. It's small and focused on deeper discussion (No images / videos / low quality posting)

Tildes

Tildes is a non-profit community site with no advertising or investors. It respects its users and their privacy, and prioritizes high-quality content and discussions.

Tildes

Christian Selig Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq Thanks for having me on Quinn, made a somber day a lot nicer by meeting you

Quinn Nelson Jun 3, 2023

@christianselig And you!

Clarko Jun 3, 2023

@christianselig @snazzyq Thank you both for doing this!

@christianselig @snazzyq Great video! Without Apollo i’m definitely dropping Reddit

Arcticulate Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig I would love it if Warren Buffet would be like ”Apollo is incredible. It is my honor to help support the effort of the developer with $20 million per year. Let’s stick it to the man!” … which will never happen, but it would have been amazing.

ChrisLTD Jun 3, 2023

@Arcticulate @snazzyq @christianselig then Reddit would up the price to $40 million per year. Reddit wants the apps gone.

Simon 🌻Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq I’m guessing it as an interview neither of you wanted but it was certainly a very interesting listen. I really hope common sense prevails.

chris overcash Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig cat doing cat things.

Anomander Rake Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig Honestly this may be the death of Reddit for mobile users, the official app is absolute dog water, I won't be using it after they drop support for third party apps. Terrible decision caused by corporate greed.

Philipp Jun 3, 2023

Great interview @christianselig ! I really hope Reddit will figure out a middle ground here.

adamz Jun 3, 2023

@christianselig @snazzyq

Ugh. This sounds super tough. Good luck.

Hunter Perrin Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig Makes me happy I stopped using Reddit. They’ve stopped considering what’s good for the user and now only consider what’s good for their income. Sadly, it will ultimately be bad for the users, but Reddit likely won’t suffer for it.

Darwin Woodka Jun 3, 2023

@hperrin @snazzyq @christianselig Yeah, I've been pissed ever since I can't get free awards to hand out. And the ads on the phone version piss me off. I can at least block them on the web.

xmlns="Dan"Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig They want to IPO, but their main product up until now had been their hundreds of moderators willing to work for them for free dealing with managing the subreddits.

There is no way to transition that to a public corp, could you imagine what'll happen when competent management are in and they discover subs like /r/legaladvice exist?

No, they are going to cash out on the AI gold rush, they are one of the few places with authentic comments that can be used to feed an LLM.

xmlns="Dan"Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig So they need to restrict anything that currently accessed the posts.

G91Productive Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig it’s my go to app each day Apollo and I’m not ready for it to go. Reddit will be another platform I leave if they kill off third party apps. It’s like they blame devs for making a better app than they themselves can offer. Idiots the lot of them. They would rather their remaining users suffer with their POS app instead of a far superior app like Apollo or Narwhal for example.

Jack Roberts Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig That was a great video it was great hearing from @christianselig perspective. I do hope that they come to there senses before July 1st. I love Apollo and I would be devastated to loose it.

pcbeard Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig @donmelton I decided to radically reduce my Reddit usage recently. I had a toxic mix of subreddits and bizarre recommendations, and I was spending too much time filtering out noise and feeling generally exhausted by Reddit.

Sounds like it’s going to be a permanent change for me. Reddit seems to shooting itself in the foot in its haste to go public. Back to USENET for me. /s

pcbeard Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig @donmelton if I only I still had my old NorthStar Advantage CP/M machine, I could fire up my trusty PBBS system. Now that was some tasty dial-up.

@snazzyq Where do I find the shirt you’re wearing in the video?

synlogic Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig I wonder if the timing and urgency is cuz Reddit is reacting to the LLM trainers

Justin Nichols Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig Yeah, if Reddit goes through with this, and if it truly decimates third party apps like Apollo, I will leave Reddit just like I left Twitter.

I love Apollo. I think it’s _the_ best Reddit app, if not _the_ best iOS app out there. It and Christian do not deserve this. Reddit users do not deserve this. Charge for the API, fine, but at least be reasonable about it. And $2 million per month is a good $1.98 million too unreasonable, at least.

sparkle Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig silver lining is that I’ve been wanting to reduce my Reddit use for a while… perhaps this will be my incentive!

Curious Badger Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq this one is really just for @christianselig but, if the API rate limit is 60/min, that’s 86,400/day, and almost 2.7m/month. In your post and interview you’ve said Apollo burned through 7bn last month. I can’t square this circle - am I missing something obvious here? There’s no malice in this question (Ultra subscriber), I just can’t see how these numbers work without Apollo using 2,500x more than the limit??

Chris Wu 🪐Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig The 30 days is what I can't wrap my head around the most. Even if the pricing wasn't astronomical how could that possibly be enough time for third party apps to code, test, alert their userbase, etc etc.

DoughyBuns Jun 3, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig RIP Reddit. I’ve been a heavy user for so long but the news this week has made me realize just how far Reddit has strayed from the network I fell in love with. I miss the days when less than half of All was images. There was great discourse back in the day, now it’s just the worst from twitter, insta, and TikTok. Reddit became 9gag

Kevin Miller Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig if Apollo goes away I pretty much won’t be using Reddit socially. How sad.

CelestialSilentLion Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig this is why I made my mastodon lol, I love the Apollo app but refuse to use the official one.

anorax Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig The 30 day time limit is onerous. If they do not reverse this decision and extend the timeline and reduce the costs to use the API I can't see how ApolloApp can survive on 1st July without bankrupting the developer.

@snazzyq This video is an excellent behind the scenes into the absolutely horrid situation that Reddit has created with this ridiculous lack of notice for the third party devs that made the platform amazing in the first place.

aardvark Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig refunds for annual subscriptions already paid. Anything else?
Frankly Reddit’s action reeks of bait and switch. A little state attorney general attention might be in order.

Bernd Kilga Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig Very nice interview, thank you!

newsorpigal Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq
@christianselig

https://lemmy.ml is having a great day!

Lemmy - A community of privacy and FOSS enthusiasts, run by Lemmy’s developers

Erlend Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig Very well done on getting this out so fast! Must've been some intense hours/days of work. 🙂

Travis Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig Reddit is jealous that they can’t make a good app and they can’t buy Apollo

@snazzyq @christianselig honestly, Excellent sit down. Thank you both for taking the time to talk on the events. I feel this video amplified awareness.

John Jun 4, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig

Definitely won’t be using Reddit on a regular basis if Apollo goes 😔

Greg Spradlin Jun 9, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig

Reddit effed up so bad the boycott made the mainstream news: 😂 https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-65855608.amp

Reddit communities to go private on Monday - BBC News

More than 1,000 subreddits will be inaccessible for 48 hours to protest changes.

BBC News

Rocketeer Jun 10, 2023

@snazzyq @christianselig

Just watching like…