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Comment by spiffytech | Hacker News Reader

There are two possibilities that I can see:

1) Spez is right, this is a tempest in a teapot that hasn't (yet) had a big impact on traffic, and won't once they seize control of the rebelling subreddits. A vocal minority cares of the public about the impact on the community, but stakeholders realize the business will be fine.

2) Spez is wrong, and is comfortable misrepresenting the situation to the public at minimum. Maybe he misrepresents it to internal stakeholders too. The situation will appear under control right up until the moment the wheels fly off.

Could be a little of column A, a little of column B.

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As you suggest, it's not binary.

Even if he's "right" what "Spez" has done here is pure idiocy.

Even if Reddit comes out of this largely unharmed, why did they even take the risk? Why didn't they just incrementally increase API pricing or implement policies that slowly kill off 3rd party apps one at a time? What he's doing is simply bad from a strategical perspective.

But further, this event has put me off ever wanting to invest in Reddit post-IPO. "Spez" seems approaching conflict like a child in an argument with their parents might. Even if you like Reddit's product I don't know how anyone in their right mind would invest in a company where a child is calling all the shots. The dude edits comments to pwn people he doesn't like, he lies, he's comes off as arrogant and entitled. It's just so unprofessional.

If anyone else was in charge I'd have assumed they wanted the controversy.

> Why didn't they just incrementally increase API pricing or implement policies that slowly kill off 3rd party apps one at a time?

Might just be a rip-off-the-bandaid type of calculation. Maybe the response sucks now, but it'll resolve in a week or two (vs having smaller protests every time one of these incremental changes take effect). Similar to how people were really angry when companies had more than one round of layoffs.

btw not an endorsement of spez's actions; just trying to game out why he might be doing it this way.

That's an interesting idea - though it'd speak really poorly of Spez's qualities as a leader. There's a reason the gas station near has a much higher price over than two decades past while from week to week you'll never see anything more than a 20cent difference and often times see a bit of price lowering to break things up. This may be due to our hunter past or something else but humans are terrible at noticing large gradual changes - but suddenly double the price in front of us and we'll definitely notice.

> Why didn't they just incrementally increase API pricing or implement policies that slowly kill off 3rd party apps one at a time?

I guess that the goal is not to kill all the 3rd party apps, but only those that make profit from the Reddit API (which doesn't include their advertising if I understand well). Now assuming that a progressive price increase would be put in place, I guess that these apps would simply offload the API tax to their user base with each new raise. As it has been mentioned elsewhere in this discussion, with an abrupt price raise in a very short time, the apps would not have enough treasury to be able to "buffer" the cost until the users pick the pace up - assuming users would, which is perhaps a more important (read: long term) worry.

It should be observed that the goal is not to kill off all 3rd party apps, since there are special exemptions for non commercial apps. I don't know if these exemptions are actually useable in practice, or if actually this is just a part of a larger scheme to get rid of all those apps while having a plausible line of deniability.

It is certainly sad for iOS users as Apollo seems to be their only option besides the web site, but I wonder why they did not see that coming miles away. Maybe they did expect a price to show up at some point, but not with such a magnitude.

The last guy like that got elected President, so…

If #1 were true, literally _anyone_ in spez's position would shut up and get on with things. The fact is that he initially did that — and then as the week has gone on, he has begun giving more and more unhinged interviews with the press. He's not saying "it blew over", he's blaming anyone and everyone he can think of, making objectively false statements about history and his own actions, and making overt threats to his perceived enemies.

It is very plainly having a much bigger impact than spez anticipated.

spez was on NPR this morning and it was hilarious. Also sad that Steve Inskeep didn't realize (alternatively: care) about the bullshit verbal games spez was playing with his answers.

That seems to be the NPR way the past few years. Allow guests of all stripes on the air to say whatever nonsense the can dream up. And then move on to the next question with no follow-up or pushback. All in the name of "neutrality".

It's not journalism and it does a disservice to their listeners.

One of the reasons I stopped listening.

I think HN underestimates the truth behind #1.

(Don't shoot the messenger! Just adding some objective data amid the flames.)

Roughly half of the biggest subreddits went dark. And almost all of them are back (r/funny, r/gaming, r/aww, r/todayilearned, /r/pics, etc)

AFAIK the only huge holdouts are r/videos and r/music.

Mods and some users have been very vocal...but there's a quieter, larger group that is fine with the official app and just wants a place to post.

---

EDIT: My bad. r/aww, r/gaming, and r/pics have disabled new posts.

Plenty of others...r/funny, r/askscience, r/earthporn, r/explainlikeimfive, r/food, r/gadgets, r/nottheonion, r/space, r/sports went dark and are now back.

Total affected subscriber count has fallen ~60% [1] since the peak.

FWIW, I think #2 is true as well. This is by no means a inconsequential disruption. But it's also far from "the death of Reddit."

[1] https://blackout.photon-reddit.com/

And this is why I always say that "but but but the mods aren't getting paid" argument makes no sense. Clearly the mods are getting _something_ out of modding, and that's their reward.

> And this is why I always say that "but but but the mods aren't getting paid" argument makes no sense. Clearly the mods are getting _something_ out of modding, and that's their reward.

That cuts both ways, however. If moderators get compensated with a sense of satisfaction rather than money, then site changes that affect their "quality of life" carry extra weight.

In plain English: if you do this for fun, then you stop doing it once it's no longer fun.

The API changes are the proximate cause of the protest, but the widespread participation suggests that many moderators were already near the breaking point. (ed: was capitulation)

I posit that this means there is (c)

Mods are out, making a tempest in a teapot, but consumers are fine -for now. Medium/longerm, no one really knows if mods will permanently quit, and whether anyone replacing them (or not) will have an effect in traffic.

It appears like a bet. Not sure if its one i'd take though if i were the CEO.

While this is true, a significant part of Reddit's appeal are the smaller communities, and they are staying closed in droves [1] [2]. There are thousands and thousands of these that are still dark, and have announced no intention of opening back up until their demands are met.

I understand that the big subs are either no longer dark, or can be forced to reopen. But that is significantly more difficult to force upon the smaller, more numerable subs.

[1] https://old.reddit.com/r/ModCoord/comments/148ks6u/indefinit...

[2] https://reddark.untone.uk

More to the point: it's that long tail of niche communities where people talk about the things that make for good site: searching. In marketing terms, these are extremely qualified leads. Many of them are people looking for reviews for something they're about to buy, or who want to talk about something they bought. It's exactly the kind of impression advertisers want to run an ad on.

The important thing is, what's the overlap between vocal users, and reddit contributors. It's always been known that reddit (as well as most of the internet really) is driven by a small % of power users. The posting, the commenting, the moderating. /u/spez says 90% of users use the default app, but I would wager that if you look at people who are actively contributing, that number will be much different.

Every person I know who uses reddit app does so very passively. They are read-only users who just ingest posts and rarely contribute. Yes the vocal minority is mostly mods and power users, but the argument here is that those are also the people who make reddit what it is.

> Roughly half of the biggest subreddits went dark. And almost all of them are back (r/funny, r/gaming, r/aww, r/todayilearned, /r/pics, etc)

Are they? They're not private, but (last I checked) at least some of those were not allowing new posts or comments.

As the resevoir of astroturfed marketing that is still a problem for Reddit.

> Roughly half of the biggest subreddits went dark. And almost all of them are back (r/funny, r/gaming, r/aww, r/todayilearned, /r/pics, etc)

As of this writing, per https://blackout.photon-reddit.com/, r/aww, r/gaming, and r/pics are all restricted to new submissions. r/music is the largest subreddit still in private mode.

While I think it is true, that many are overestimating the impact, I'd like to correct your comment:

At least r/gaming, r/aww and r/pics are still restricted and do not allow new post or comments.

So the protest is still going with some really big subreddits supporting the cause.

There's no doubt that Reddit, in some form, would survive if Spez were to keep a firm line, unilaterally replace volunteer moderators, and cater to that "larger group."

But that in some form should be terrifying to institutional investors evaluating or underwriting this IPO. Will users under the new status quo have significantly different retention patterns and lifetime value when consuming content moderated by the moderators that led Reddit to the point where it's able to IPO in the first place?

It's very possible that retention numbers drop through the floor because subreddits lose the unique character that made Reddit different from any other social media platform - a character traced through a continuous history of mods on large and small subreddits, chosen as stewards of established per-subreddit culture, now to be wiped away. In the current market environment, doesn't that make Reddit a riskier investment than ever?

And it wouldn't take a lot to fix. Spez doesn't even necessarily need to reverse the API restrictions. He just needs to communicate and listen to mods with empathy, and establish that empathy publicly and privately as a top company priority. It's not too late for him to do that and save the company. And the more he refuses to do that, the more questions investors will ask about his readiness to lead.

>But that in some form should be terrifying to institutional investors evaluating or underwriting this IPO

Far more terrifying is a site that is perpetually at the mercy of a handful of powerusers. That if the winds change, they collectively could tank the value of the product with no way for investors to intervene. If I were going to invest in Reddit, I would want the CEO to show that ultimately he/reddit is in control. He is a known, predictable quantity. He is also someone that can be replaced if things go too far off the rails. The whims of the pseudo-aristocracy is completely out of my control.

That 'handful of power users' is behind much of the value creation on that site. Reddit.com was always at their mercy, nothing substantial has changed here.

By power users I meant current moderators. Of course there are other power users that post content for fake points. but they have different motivations. The moderators are far more expendable than the power posters. There is no end of people willing to sacrifice their free time for the status of being a mod of a large sub. The point is to make sure everyone knows that ultimately reddit is in charge and find a collective of mods that are OK with the status quo and know not to rock the boat too much.

It's a symbiosis though. Power posters add content for fake points because there is moderation to keep spam, trash, flamewars (when strictly moderated) at bay so their posts are not lost in the noise.

If a subreddit for a class of products gets flooded with sale spam, low quality content, memes, it will push the users who create higher quality content away. The same for a subreddit about hobbies, if it's not curated to have a good intro FAQ and collection of guides for beginners, and good moderation that is empathetic but can enforce guidelines on questions that constantly pop up, it will push people away because of the noise.

Moderation on reddit is what can control the noise, with a low signal-to-noise ratio the power posters disappear.

I agree with the first paragraph. As to the rest, the finance people could dump the stock on someone assuming there will be a period of (un)reasonable optimism not far from the IPO. This is par for the course with overhyped stocks AFAIK. They even can have some semblance of profitability from running Reddit completely as a Skinner box internet chum feeder with brand recognition.

I think the best scenario (globally) is that a new generation of internet power users, at least 5-20% of them, would learn federation and forums. This could be a lesson for... half a decade, maybe. The ones foolish enough to stay in their pens will be only having it worse as time goes on.

> but there's a quieter, larger group that is fine with the official app and just wants a place to post.

That'd be me, although slightly different. I've been on that site a long time. I have an account is amongst the first thousand to join it. 17 years.

The official app is fine for me when I decide to use it, which is rare. I just don't use my phone for "apps" that often unless I really need to. Otherwise I'm still on the site daily, on a computer.

I don't get the hatred. It shows ads, unlike what you can get on the computer. Other than that? I guess I'm not the target market. It works.

I'm the same. PC master race, as they say ;)

Just like the new site, I can't comprehend how people like the official app. Although I've been using Reddit since 2008, having access on a mobile phone has always been vastly more convenient for me personally. Redditisfun, Diode, BaconReader, Apollo; all of these third party apps kept me going to reddit.

For me reddit without the superior functionality of a group of competing third party apps just isn't worth participating in anymore.

But I recognize a lot of people don't care, or won't be bothered by the changes. For me it just gets added to the list of sites I watched crumble to a shell of their former selves. I was addicted to Reddit in 08/09 and had many sleepless nights digging around niche subs for interesting stories. But like my daily slashdot habit from the early 2000's I move on when its time to give up on a site.

The lifecycle of website enshitification rolls on.

I'm glad it works for you, but its never worked right for me. It always seemed to be messing up links and the UI is so bad. I prefer my client to be minimal and functional and that's why I went with Reddit is Fun. Simple UI that worked and could manage the comment section successfully.

Honestly, it feels like the Reddit team saw one of the "Everything Apps" from China and thought its UI and UX where something to be modeled after.

I simply wish they would have attempted to buy Apollo and RiF. Then offer them up as official clients. RiF is the only way that I will interact with Reddit because of the way it is laid out and how functional it is. That's where my hate come from. They are effectively killing Reddit for many of us.

> I'm glad it works for you, but its never worked right for me. It always seemed to be messing up links and the UI is so bad.

It's not that it works for me really, it's I'm not the target market.

I obviously getting on in the years. I have a 17 year old Reddit account and I signed up for that at work!

I just don't use my phone for apps like Reddit. I use it for what I need to, calling, texting, delivery apps, banking, navigation, music and that's about it.

If I'm sitting in the doctor's office lounge too long I may fire up Reddit's official app otherwise I don't use it.

I can see the benefits Apollo and others bring, they look far better from all angles. I just don't need them.

But I'm not alone, that's why this whole fiasco will likely blow over. Most people don't know and/or don't care about these apps, but they use Reddit. The HN crowd is not your typical home user, or a "get off my lawn" type like myself. Even though I have multiple decades of working as a software engineer.

Now should they be doing this now? Should they be trying to rush this IPO and these profitability targets and whatever to get that big payout?

No, they shouldn't. But that's the choice they made.

>But I'm not alone, that's why this whole fiasco will likely blow over. Most people don't know and/or don't care about these apps, but they use Reddit. The HN crowd is not your typical home user, or a "get off my lawn" type like myself. Even though I have multiple decades of working as a software engineer.

I mean sure, its not the vast majority of users utilize 3rd party apps. I also wouldn't say its a small number. RiF has been downloaded on the Android App store 5 Million times. That's just one of the apps. I know apollo has even more users. I'm not on IOS so I cant really search it right (not willing to lol).

I am sure it will blow over also, but the site is going to be worse for it. Its also a matter of time before he comes to remove old.reddit in hopes of squeezing blood from the stone. Its not a profitable venture. It wasn't and never will be.

Do you use the new reddit.com? It’s almost unbearably slow and bloated, and rather than optimizing it they’re just stuffing it full of idiotic "social" features. And if you use old.reddit.com, well, I doubt it’s going to live much longer.

I actually do.

Since I've been on the site for 17 years, I remember old.reddit.com well.

But things change, times move on, we adapt.

So I'm using the new layout, dark mode, compact mode, no subreddit styles. As simple as I can get it.

Slower? Yes. But it doesn't look like I'm back in 2006 again either.

Honestly as someone who's tried a bunch of android 3rd party apps, I think the official one is good for browsing the site. Customization/feature set is very limited, and the TikTok-vertical-video mode is annoying, but you can swipe between posts horizontally which I use a lot to browse through posts and read comments. That flow isn't present on a lot of third party apps. Also, some other apps don't vary post layout by post type which means if I'm scrolling down through reddit and want to see full size images, it inevitably means link posts have enlarged thumbnails which takes up feed space.

If someone made the official reddit app have customizable colored comment depth lines and added a toggle for the video mode I would be very happy with it.

Obviously I'm just being picky here, I'm very used to the official app. Also, people can patch out ads on Android with revanced anyways.

Regarding 1: I don't believe the company saying this at all.

My $DayJob has been running Reddit Ads campaigns for the last couple months. Starting Monday we saw a ~60% drop in impressions. They have not come back up yet, they've continued to decline all week.

I can guarantee you that there are reporters who would love to talk to you. You should seriously consider approaching one of those, and I hope that you do so.

I remember seeing a public statement from Reddit saying their revenue hasn't been impacted by the blackout.

Maybe ad impressions are dropping while ad clicks remain steady? Assuming ads are PPC.

Highly unlikely, that would imply that CTRs are going up during a partial user revolt / shutdown. On the other hand, perhaps Reddit could squeeze a little extra ad revenue per click given they control the market prices.

What seems more likely Spez is lying and/or saying this with the subtext that a week of disruption hasn't impacted what their projected quarterly revenue will be, because they'll have time to revise those projections and smooth it all over by the time they IPO. But re-projections never happen in real time, it'll take a few months to see if they're deviating far enough to require a downward projection.

We saw that he's a fucking liar when dealing with Apollo. Credibility is now zero. Zero.

Yeah whether he’s ‘right’ is kind of immaterial - he’s shown himself to be untrustworthy, and that’s enough for me. I don’t deal with liars, they’re not worth my time.

Having modded a phpBB forum with <1k active users in the late 00s/early 10s, I used to have some sympathy for bearing the burden of being the world's biggest forum admin, but that all vanished when he started defaming the Apollo dev by spreading blackmail rumors. That's some Alex Jones-tier hyperbole, completely unbecoming of anyone in a position of leadership (and should be concerning to any reddit shareholders from a liability perspective).

reddit shareholders and reddit employees

> That's some Alex Jones-tier hyperbole, completely unbecoming of anyone in a position of leadership

What sort of naive idealism is this? People in power will exercise that power however they see fit as long as they believe they can get away with it. With Reddit of course it’s even easier as there’s no real stake/serious consequences (or at least the owners seem to believe there’s not). People don’t get leadership positions because of their superior ethics and morals.

What Spez is wrong about is the "opportunity cost" of third party apps that he keeps citing as reason for his "business decision." He has no basis to assume that the same people who use third party apps will use the official reddit app, or ever spend any money on reddit.

It mostly likely a combination. This could blow over with the correct PR campaign. Spez idiocy is making this way worse than it should have been and risking everything.

If Reddit just came out and said they can’t support third party apps. They are not profitable and they need to focus on their ad business. Third party undermine the business.

Inside they killed third party apps, while lying about it. They keep doubling down on this passive aggressive point of view.

This is making the community and mods realize that they are providing all the value and not getting any of the benefit. This is becoming much bigger than about third party apps.

> Spez is wrong, and is comfortable misrepresenting the situation to the public at minimum.

I don't know if he's right or wrong, but it's pretty clear that he's comfortable misrepresenting things to the public.

My theory: Reddit wants total control over the UI, the current one (as bad as it is) supports dangerous levels of discussion and collective cognition, and having the masses thinking for/between themselves is rarely a good idea if one is in the business of maintaining an illusory political regime. Just think of how much of reality is manufactured and distributed among nodes on this single platform.

I think it comes down to if there is a viable alternative. People don't stop what they like to do but they will move with sufficient pressure.

What people crave is not a site with up/down vote, or even a site with specific information about topics.

What they crave is community.

I am betting that the big winner of all this will be Discord.

I feel like discord has long since won this battle. It was over as soon as nearly every subreddit started to create community discords.

Which is still a bad thing as now all that hoarded reddit data that comes up when I look for problem solutions is going to move to tech support discord channels for that community and vanish from the public web.

The social media site cycle iterates again. I hope Discord takes a while to go to fall apart, it is nice for small group chats (just a couple old friends); it will be a pain to replace that platform.

Discord already started it's enshitification with the 'pay to get your preferred username' goldrush.

I think the 10% active participants will be happy with discord. I'm less sure the other 90% lurkers will.

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