I think the problem is that the API concerns are more around LLMs having easy access points to their data than anything else. Still, this could have been avoided by providing free-use keys to trusted developers. It's not like there are that many of them. Just seems odd how dark they've been towards this user class. It's very similar to the Twitter changes.
The nuke approach they've done will send so many of their important, core users off the site.
Presumably the entire 2005-2023 (up to March) dataset which is (was) freely available on Pushshift / torrents is enough?
Also, not that Sam Altman is unbiased, but he did say that social media (Reddit, Twitter) were not super important for developing LLMs (But of course, that's exactly what he would say if they were useful!)
But sure, there are plenty of other data sources as well. On top of the problem of not wanting to train your data on content you know is littered with bots.
Significant outdated cultural knowledge seems the norm for humans too.
This approach mostly doesn't work because, for third-party client apps that don't go through the developer's own server, scrapers could snag those keys from the client. Scraping has always been a thing and I don't see a foolproof solution that allows good actors to use the product without bad actors getting to scrape content (not that scrapers won't settle for html scraping).
And proxying api calls isn't an end-all solution. This introduces a large burden for the developer to not just run a scalable proxy for the API calls, but also must introduce and manage some abuse prevention system, maybe with their own user account system with reputation ratings based on number of times they've hit a rate limit or how many different subreddits they try to access every day.
It also is generally not good for users to have to deal with a proxy like this, since it means the app developer has the ability to log all of their users' usage, and could be compelled by law enforcement / courts to hand over user PII or activity logs.
One of the problems mentioned in the many Reddit threads discussing the issue about Apollo, is that its creator was selling ULTRA LIFETIME MEMBERSHIPS[2]. Yes, they were charging people money, taking it, then using a free API to deliver paying members their value. The developer now feels he cannot charge lifetime members an extra $2.5/month because he promised them he wouldn't
Beyond the discussion of is Reddit about to die or not, selling LIFETIME access to someone elses free API is a dumb move, which will always end badly
I think Reddit charging $2.5/month for API access is more than fair
[1] https://www.theverge.com/2023/5/31/23743993/reddit-apollo-cl...
[2] https://www.reddit.com/r/apolloapp/comments/r3npbm/last_call...
Perhaps you should read Christian’s post on Reddit [1] where he described, in detail, what this truly means and how he was effectively lied to by Reddit; and an interview where he states that he actually understands Reddit charging for API access — he doesn’t understand why the burden is being put on the app developers and why they didn’t give app developers considerable more time to make the adjustment with respect to their own pricing [2].
Reddit isn’t wrong for trying to monetize their API to cover service and server costs. Reddit is absolutely wrong for lying to app developers, charging an egregious amount to the app developers, and for not giving them enough time to be able to change their pricing terms and not leave developers on the hook for millions while existing pricing tiers (such as someone who paid in advance) still have months before renewal.
[1] https://reddit.com/r/apolloapp/comments/13ws4w3/had_a_call_w...
Putting aside the bad salesmanship and planning of selling a forever license, it is absolutely way too much money.
That's my point though. Reddit is NOT charging $2.5/mo for API access. It is charging a set amount per app (based on overall usage), and the developer has to now be in the business of creating and charging for a whole new subscription themselves to make up for what they have to pay Reddit.
I don't. I agree with you on the lifetime Apollo access. That was dumb. But $2.5/user/month is crazy for Reddit. Facebook incurs around $2/user/month in costs. I'm sorry, but there's just no comparison in terms of the platform features, stability, performance, and infrastructure. With 430 million monthly active users, either Reddit is valuing their cost at $12.9 billion annually (pro rata), or they're adding a very healthy profit margin to that charge. It's clearly the latter.
Smart on him for selling those…
That's the point: let the users pay you to make up for the (potential?) revenue you're not making from tracking them. Estimates put reddit at something like $0.25 per user. Pushing them to the official app might _generously_ triple that number. Versus the user paying $5/mo? It's a braindead business case to say that users in your official app are materially better than the same users directly paying for the service they actually want.
There are technical issues too. Many users report issues playing videos and gifs.
Finally, the Reddit app serves ads.
You can fix both these issues in the app settings. Turning off feed thumbnails is also a big improvement.
You cannot. The "classic" layout is still less information dense than Apollo, and disabling autoplay only disables autoplaying videos in the "card" layout. Videos still auto-play once a user taps a submission.
While we're here, I forgot how hostile their navigation menu is. At the bottom of the app Reddit has "Home," "Discover," "Create," "Chat," and "Inbox." The latter doesn't even take one to their inbox. It takes them to their *activity." These are clearly not the most used actions on Reddit. They're the actions Reddit wants to encourage.
It's an absolutely insane and frustrating UX. Things slide in from different directions and there are multiple UI elements with similar (but not identical) functionality. That's on top of crap like not being able to download gifs and videos right to my device and the built in video player being broken. There are so many other major social media apps that do things so much better it just boggles my mind at how bad reddit's is. TikTok is so smooth and easy to use, even Facebook is better.
In Apollo on the other hand, I view my comments by tapping the "profile" button at the bottom of the screen. In a comment thread, to view a user's history, tap their name and their history pops up. It's smooth and intuitive and fast and simple. I always "go back" views by sliding from the left - the interactions never change depending on context so I always know exactly how to navigate intuitively.
They say a product reflects the organization that produced it, and it's clear from the app that this is a company with unchecked Promo-Driven-Development and Resume-Driven-Development. There is no impressive metric that measures app jankiness or design clarity in isolation, and the effort to fix it is disproportionately larger than the line that it adds to your resume or promo package. So even though it's glaringly obvious that the app is broken within 3 seconds of opening it, not a single person anywhere in the org is incentivized to fix it.
Then why is that not an option? The narrative that they want more tracking and control makes sense with the facts we have.
* https://www.reddit.com/r/modnews/comments/13wshdp/api_update...
"If you are using OAuth for authentication: 100 queries per minute per OAuth client id
If you are not using OAuth for authentication: 10 queries per minute"
edit: Ah, it also requires applying for an API key on their support website which may or may not be granted to you by Reddit and might take some amount of time. That is not comparable to having proper API access.
It's all about the money and tracking the user.
Why would they force users to do something they're not too pleased about if it wasn't entirely for generating revenue of some description?
Probably not. It's about money, not enforcing a uniform experience.
Plus: a subscription would drive many users away.
I’m not saying that Reddit handled it well. Buy your option doesn’t seem to be any better.
Reddit won because it was the Digg-alternative, they’ve always been on shaky ground if people just start posting less. What ever per-impression value they get now on their own apps/website will plummet if people just start using it less, regardless if they’re making ad revenue off every user or only some users.
Plus, yeah it’s an awesome LLM training resource. Make it cheap, why not? Your competitors are expensive, and your data is well indexed by topic and conversational in tone.
Because of Reddit's current practices, I've cancelled my premium membership. I'll likely move on from Reddit unless they chart a path where I and others can continue to use our third party clients happily.
Are we living in different universes?
Less than 1% of Reddit users will be impacted by these changes. If all the people who are upset at this leave, it will have almost no impact to Reddit. A few niche subreddits may die, but that's it.
Reddit probably did the math and figured the churn was worth it to get everyone seeing ads. Facebook is much more optimized for ads, but optimizing Reddit's ads is probably easier than getting more people to pay. The latter would probably require paywalling more which is just as icky.