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I'm sorry but how exactly is it being evil to shut down 3rd party clients that use your content and your bandwidth to make (huge amounts of) money off of you?

I'm sorry but how exactly is it being evil to shut down 3rd party clients that use your content and your bandwidth to make (huge amounts of) money off of you? Reddit owes absolutely nothing to those developers. This guy has to reimburse 250K of subscriptions, meaning he made millions, if not tens of millions, off of exploiting the API while not displaying Reddit's ads. Poor Apollo developer, he's going to have to wipe his tears with Benjamins and blow his nose with his silk disposable tissue.

treesknees 3y ago
If you read his post, he presents all the information you need to know that this isn't true. Reddit themselves admitted that the cost isn't about server/bandwidth usage but opportunity cost per user on 3rd party apps. And it's not exploiting the API if you are using the API within the terms of service agreed to when registering the API token. Apollo wasn't exploiting or abusing anything.
notaustinpowers 3y ago
1) Apollo exploited nothing. Reddit offered their API for free for years. 2) Sure, he made a ton of money running Apollo, doesn't make what Reddit did less scummy. 3) No requirement, but it's largely accepted as courtesy to notify developers of any changes to the API policy, especially when it comes to pricing. Giving the developer only 30 days to rework their business model, change app architecture/design/code, pass App Store Reviews with Apple/Google, migrate subscribers to a higher-priced tier to afford the increase in pricing, and more is tantamount to spitting in their face. Especially when it's a drastic change from 8+ years of more or less the same. 4) Even if the developer did update pricing to be able to afford the new API rates, the developer himself stated he would have to be $50,000/month in the red for months while he waits for current subscription holders to have their subscription terms expire and renew at the increase rate, and that doesn't count lost subscribers who just decide to not renew. 5) Reddit admins and their CEO slandered the developer in interviews, outright lied, and got caught as the developer recorded the audio of all of their calls proving those lies. Reddit has done this stuff before (Back in 2016 the CEO was caught editing comments critical of him in the production database). 6) Reddit has every right to do what their doing, as Apollo has every right to call them out on how shit this whole thing is, when just back in January they said they had no plans to change their APIs in the short or medium term. Bad situation all around, but Reddit knows they're doing this to kill third-party apps. They just have to lie that they're being reasonable to save face so investors will buy them up when they go public in a few months.
- Jaepa 3y ago
  > 3) No requirement, but it's largely accepted as courtesy to notify developers of any changes to the API policy, especially when it comes to pricing. Giving the developer only 30 days to rework their business model, change app architecture/design/code, pass App Store Reviews with Apple/Google, migrate subscribers to a higher-priced tier to afford the increase in pricing, and more is tantamount to spitting in their face. Especially when it's a drastic change from 8+ years of more or less the same. Doubly so if you've been repeatably telling developers you're not changing it & that developer has reach out specifically to say I know you have an IPO soon. Anything we can do on our end.
fkyoureadthedoc 3y ago
Reddit had no mobile app for years, and yet a ton of mobile users on 3rd party apps. Their own mobile app used to be a 3rd party app that they bought out. So without even getting into other creative uses of the API, they definitely owe some of their popularity to 3rd party mobile app developers. How much? Who can really say how Reddit would have evolved if it had no public API.

treesknees 3y ago

If you read his post, he presents all the information you need to know that this isn't true. Reddit themselves admitted that the cost isn't about server/bandwidth usage but opportunity cost per user on 3rd party apps. And it's not exploiting the API if you are using the API within the terms of service agreed to when registering the API token. Apollo wasn't exploiting or abusing anything.

notaustinpowers 3y ago

1) Apollo exploited nothing. Reddit offered their API for free for years. 2) Sure, he made a ton of money running Apollo, doesn't make what Reddit did less scummy. 3) No requirement, but it's largely accepted as courtesy to notify developers of any changes to the API policy, especially when it comes to pricing. Giving the developer only 30 days to rework their business model, change app architecture/design/code, pass App Store Reviews with Apple/Google, migrate subscribers to a higher-priced tier to afford the increase in pricing, and more is tantamount to spitting in their face. Especially when it's a drastic change from 8+ years of more or less the same. 4) Even if the developer did update pricing to be able to afford the new API rates, the developer himself stated he would have to be $50,000/month in the red for months while he waits for current subscription holders to have their subscription terms expire and renew at the increase rate, and that doesn't count lost subscribers who just decide to not renew. 5) Reddit admins and their CEO slandered the developer in interviews, outright lied, and got caught as the developer recorded the audio of all of their calls proving those lies. Reddit has done this stuff before (Back in 2016 the CEO was caught editing comments critical of him in the production database). 6) Reddit has every right to do what their doing, as Apollo has every right to call them out on how shit this whole thing is, when just back in January they said they had no plans to change their APIs in the short or medium term. Bad situation all around, but Reddit knows they're doing this to kill third-party apps. They just have to lie that they're being reasonable to save face so investors will buy them up when they go public in a few months.

Jaepa 3y ago
> 3) No requirement, but it's largely accepted as courtesy to notify developers of any changes to the API policy, especially when it comes to pricing. Giving the developer only 30 days to rework their business model, change app architecture/design/code, pass App Store Reviews with Apple/Google, migrate subscribers to a higher-priced tier to afford the increase in pricing, and more is tantamount to spitting in their face. Especially when it's a drastic change from 8+ years of more or less the same. Doubly so if you've been repeatably telling developers you're not changing it & that developer has reach out specifically to say I know you have an IPO soon. Anything we can do on our end.

fkyoureadthedoc 3y ago

Reddit had no mobile app for years, and yet a ton of mobile users on 3rd party apps. Their own mobile app used to be a 3rd party app that they bought out. So without even getting into other creative uses of the API, they definitely owe some of their popularity to 3rd party mobile app developers. How much? Who can really say how Reddit would have evolved if it had no public API.