Reddit Message Boards Dark In Major Protest Over Fees For Third-Party Developers; Site Goes Down
12.06.2023 - 17:01
/ deadline.com
Reddit communities including some of its biggest clicked into to private mode today, meaning not accessible to the broader public, as they carried through on threats to protest the platform’s fees hikes to third-party app developers.
The protest hit the site Monday with users reporting widespread problems loading content. The company’s latest at 8:47 PT said, “We’re observing improvements across the site and expect issue to recover for most users. We will continue to closely monitor the situation.”
Dozens of the thousands of communities, called subreddits, that are now in blackout mode have over a million subscribers — from r/videos and r/reactiongifs to r/earthporn. The protests is expected to run for 48 hours, although some subreddits that depend on third parties could permanently shutter thereafter. In many cases it seems moderators can’t do what they need with just the tools available through the official app.
Fees Reddit now wants to charge third-party software developers for access to the company’s API (application programming interface) could run into the millions annually, which many can’t afford.
Reddit had indicated its intentions earlier this spring and the mass protest had been in the works for weeks.
A subreddit moderator, BuckRowdy, wrote that third-party apps can “offer superior mod tools, customization, streamlined interfaces, and other quality of life improvements that the official app does not offer.” In an open letter that he asked other moderators to sign, he said: “The potential loss of these services due to the pricing change would significantly impact our ability to moderate efficiently.”
He added, “the prohibitive cost threatens to make it difficult to mod from mobile, stifle innovation, limit