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Comment by wlesieutre | Hacker News Reader

Don't you want to view it in the official Reddit app for the best experience?

No, no I don't. And the official reddit app is not the best experience.

Trying to annoy me into shaping my behavior into what you want means you 'win': I'll stop talking to you your web server entirely, and screw your app.

There is no site (other than my own) so unique that I can't find a replacement.

After their bizarre cartoon-like remake I feel the best reddit experience is converging on none at all. In particular reading deeply into reply-heavy threads has devolved into rapidly scanning thin columns of text. They've managed to migrate the experience of reading a poorly designed website on mobile to the desktop!

It’s a matter of time before they acquire the top app or two and block the rest.

Eh I doubt the Apollo guy would be interested in selling, but I've been surprised before.

They could bully him into selling, same way as Twitter has slowly strangulated 3rd party clients.

Guess it's a matter of time before I stop using Reddit then.

I already ran to Relay as an escape from Reddit's astonishingly garbage mobile browser experience. Next stop is the door.

https://reddit.com/.compact

https://i.reddit.com

That’s what use and consider to be the best reddit mobile experience. The regular reddit mobile site doesn’t seem to render on iOS Safari properly most of the time, probably by design.

To repeat myself, reddit, in most cases, should be avoided anyway so you will gain by doing so.

IIRC the official app is from them buying AlienBlue, which used to be the best one on iOS. These days it's Apollo.

Apollo recently moved some push notification features behind a subscription to cover ongoing costs, separate from their "Pro" one time in-app purchase, so I think Reddit is at least taking a cut from API usage by other clients.

Weirdly, most of the features Apollo puts behind the subscription tier are features I think foster unhealthy engagement with Reddit and I'm just as happy to not have hanging over me.

I'd be happy to pay them, but I actually don't WANT push notifications, posting from the app, or any of the other stuff that encourages websites to pull you in deeper.

And the only reason I even use Apollo is because mobile Reddit is a nightmare UX. Literally a case study in how to make a horrid, horrible experience on the mobile web.

Same boat here, I've got Pro but have no desire for notifications.

I don't use the iOS versions, but IIRC they never really did anything with AlienBlue after the purchase, and the "official" mobile app is a totally separate project.

It was an acqui-hire. He wrote the new reddit app, too.

No he didn't. This was the developer, he's been gone from reddit for over 2 years now: https://www.reddit.com/user/jase

It's not even close to the best experience.

Often when I "open in the app", I just get sent to the homepage of my app with no way to find the random post I had been trying to view.

They don't clarify who the experience is best for. Is it best for the user? No. Is it best for their business model? Most likely.

What would you recommend? I bought Reddit sync pro years ago and I'm happy with it. My only complaint is the in-app imgur browser doesn't always work.

This reminds me of Tumblr, which I'm sure none of you have heard of or remember :) But seriously it's always like "Open in the Tumblr app for the best experience." I finally gave it a try and it was a serious downgrade in my opinion!

But you did give it a try.

t. Tumblr marketing department

"so the touchbar has a steep learning curve [for you]" - Apple to me on phone asking to switch to none touchbar mbp. Also probably any website app evangelist.

The Reddit mobile app is so shit. It would be less annoying if their app was actually usable but the website is so much easier to use. I'm so tired of them trying to force me to use their bad app, using shady practices to make me accidentally click on links that open the app.

I gave up and used their app after being hit with that 100s of times. Whether it is a viable long term strategy or not they probably are driving ad revenue from it, bit of a sad state of affairs if you have to be hostile to your users to build a sustainable business.

I wish they'd offer the option to open in Relay or whatever your preferred app is..the official Reddit app sucks.

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