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Reads to me like this Christian guy asked for 10 mill to shut down his app. Why would they want to pay him that, instead of HIM paying THEM 20 mill? They are ha

Reads to me like this Christian guy asked for 10 mill to shut down his app. Why would they want to pay him that, instead of HIM paying THEM 20 mill? They are happy with him just going away. Sounds to me like a threat without having actually anything in hand to threaten with.

zamadatix 3y ago
From listening to the audio clip, my understanding was he was trying to point out the absurdity in Reddit's claim the app actually cost them $20,000,000 per year by facetiously pointing out, if it were true, they could have gotten the app permanently for a steal of half that yearly cost and both of them would have been significantly richer. It didn't seem like he was ever legitimately asking for $10,000,000 to shut down the app, he knew it didn't cost that much and wasn't worth that much. If he thought it was actually worth so much, he wouldn't be shutting it down now.
- auggierose 3y ago
  I don't know, the argument doesn't work for me. Again, why would they pay him half the current operating cost to go away (even if that is not 20 mill)? Weird. Also weird to release audio publicly based on hear-say, the Steve guy didn't accuse him publicly of anything. I'd be very careful to be on the phone with this Christian guy, because, I might also "miss" (did he mention it at any point to the other guy?) that he is recording the conversation.
  - zamadatix 3y ago
    > Again, why would they pay him half the current operating cost to go away (even if that is not 20 mill)? Again, the insinuation was that if anything was actually costing them the absurd $20,000,000 per year for multiple years then they would have had equally absurd ways of dealing with it, like paying a ridiculous $10,000,000 for Apollo and still saving tens of millions of dollars, which would have made more sense to do than what they did (let it go for years). The most obvious interpretation of this is "So obviously it's not costing you that absurdly, and we all know it. Now stop jerking me around on this API price being 'reasonable'." not "And that's why I'm asking you to actually pay me $10,000,000 to go away". This method of pointing out how absurd the API pricing is came from a user, prior to the call: https://www.reddit.com/r/apolloapp/comments/13ws4w3/comment/jme726n/?context=3 https://www.reddit.com/r/apolloapp/comments/13ws4w3/comment/... (the "/s" means sarcasm, in case you were thinking they were being serious as well). > Also weird to release audio publicly based on hear-say, the Steve guy didn't accuse him publicly of anything. It's not just private hearsay, the two quotes attributed to Steve are from the moderation call transcript which has been shared and verified. > I'd be very careful to be on the phone with this Christian guy, because, I might also "miss" (did he mention it at any point to the other guy?) that he is recording the conversation. I'd be worried about talking to someone who feels the need to be careful when they know the call is recorded.
    - auggierose 3y ago
      Sarcasm doesn't play well when talking about a sales deal. Parroting some reddit's user's words doesn't help, either. > I'd be worried about talking to someone who feels the need to be careful when they know the call is recorded. You'll do alright then in our nice little surveillance earth. Personally, I don't like to talk to people who record me without telling me so, no matter what I say.
      - zamadatix 3y ago
        It usually doesn't doesn't, which is likely why he apologized for joking during the conversation at the same time Reddit apologized for misinterpreting what was said on multiple levels (both in the same audio clip). The point wasn't it was the best tactic that could have been used, just that it was clearly not a serious ask on his part where he expected them to actually buy it. And I don't like to talk to people uncomfortable with the idea I can verify what they said to me. Surveillance is one thing when it's a third party, but it's a completely different thing when it's the person you're already sharing the information with. In the former problems about who you intended to communicate with and a third party with more power than that initial two come into play, in the latter those don't exist (unless your goal is to publicly lie about the conversation and push the recording to be shared, as was done here, in which I have little sympathy for lamenting you can't rely on doing that with me). But yeah, not everyone agrees on this one. Even the law is highly varied in this regard.
        auggierose 3y ago
        A recording involves third-parties, otherwise you wouldn't need a recording. As we can see now, everyone, even fourth and tenth parties can listen to this recording by going to a website. You can even say that Steve didn't give in to blackmail tactics, and Christian then killed the hostage (published the recording). I don't see much of a motive here for Christian except for revenge of some form (probably for taking away a lucrative income stream). What is legal or not has not much to do with what is morally right or not, as the law is supposed to be objective, and morals are always subjective. In my book, publishing an unauthorised recording like that touches rock bottom morally.

zamadatix 3y ago

From listening to the audio clip, my understanding was he was trying to point out the absurdity in Reddit's claim the app actually cost them $20,000,000 per year by facetiously pointing out, if it were true, they could have gotten the app permanently for a steal of half that yearly cost and both of them would have been significantly richer. It didn't seem like he was ever legitimately asking for $10,000,000 to shut down the app, he knew it didn't cost that much and wasn't worth that much. If he thought it was actually worth so much, he wouldn't be shutting it down now.

auggierose 3y ago
I don't know, the argument doesn't work for me. Again, why would they pay him half the current operating cost to go away (even if that is not 20 mill)? Weird. Also weird to release audio publicly based on hear-say, the Steve guy didn't accuse him publicly of anything. I'd be very careful to be on the phone with this Christian guy, because, I might also "miss" (did he mention it at any point to the other guy?) that he is recording the conversation.
- zamadatix 3y ago
  > Again, why would they pay him half the current operating cost to go away (even if that is not 20 mill)? Again, the insinuation was that if anything was actually costing them the absurd $20,000,000 per year for multiple years then they would have had equally absurd ways of dealing with it, like paying a ridiculous $10,000,000 for Apollo and still saving tens of millions of dollars, which would have made more sense to do than what they did (let it go for years). The most obvious interpretation of this is "So obviously it's not costing you that absurdly, and we all know it. Now stop jerking me around on this API price being 'reasonable'." not "And that's why I'm asking you to actually pay me $10,000,000 to go away". This method of pointing out how absurd the API pricing is came from a user, prior to the call: https://www.reddit.com/r/apolloapp/comments/13ws4w3/comment/jme726n/?context=3 https://www.reddit.com/r/apolloapp/comments/13ws4w3/comment/... (the "/s" means sarcasm, in case you were thinking they were being serious as well). > Also weird to release audio publicly based on hear-say, the Steve guy didn't accuse him publicly of anything. It's not just private hearsay, the two quotes attributed to Steve are from the moderation call transcript which has been shared and verified. > I'd be very careful to be on the phone with this Christian guy, because, I might also "miss" (did he mention it at any point to the other guy?) that he is recording the conversation. I'd be worried about talking to someone who feels the need to be careful when they know the call is recorded.
  - auggierose 3y ago
    Sarcasm doesn't play well when talking about a sales deal. Parroting some reddit's user's words doesn't help, either. > I'd be worried about talking to someone who feels the need to be careful when they know the call is recorded. You'll do alright then in our nice little surveillance earth. Personally, I don't like to talk to people who record me without telling me so, no matter what I say.
    - zamadatix 3y ago
      It usually doesn't doesn't, which is likely why he apologized for joking during the conversation at the same time Reddit apologized for misinterpreting what was said on multiple levels (both in the same audio clip). The point wasn't it was the best tactic that could have been used, just that it was clearly not a serious ask on his part where he expected them to actually buy it. And I don't like to talk to people uncomfortable with the idea I can verify what they said to me. Surveillance is one thing when it's a third party, but it's a completely different thing when it's the person you're already sharing the information with. In the former problems about who you intended to communicate with and a third party with more power than that initial two come into play, in the latter those don't exist (unless your goal is to publicly lie about the conversation and push the recording to be shared, as was done here, in which I have little sympathy for lamenting you can't rely on doing that with me). But yeah, not everyone agrees on this one. Even the law is highly varied in this regard.
      - auggierose 3y ago
        A recording involves third-parties, otherwise you wouldn't need a recording. As we can see now, everyone, even fourth and tenth parties can listen to this recording by going to a website. You can even say that Steve didn't give in to blackmail tactics, and Christian then killed the hostage (published the recording). I don't see much of a motive here for Christian except for revenge of some form (probably for taking away a lucrative income stream). What is legal or not has not much to do with what is morally right or not, as the law is supposed to be objective, and morals are always subjective. In my book, publishing an unauthorised recording like that touches rock bottom morally.