3 ms·

I'm not sure if threatening a corporate entity who can change their API at any time is a feature here. See: PushShift, Nitter, Youtube Vanced

rglullis 2y ago
There are levels of survival we are prepared to accept... 1) A lot of Reddit's usefulness comes from the bots. If they shut down the API entirely, they would lose a lot of value which would accelerate their demise. 2) A more cynical person would say that without bots, Reddit would lose 30-40% of its "traffic", and that they can not afford to do that. This is why the current API is still quite generous. It's enough for most bots, but just too expensive for third-party clients. 3) Even if Reddit shut down its API tomorrow, the majority of interesting content has already been copied/archived. 4) Scraping old.reddit is quite easy, and getting rid of it altogether is not something that they are willing to do. All in all, I'd say that if we ever get to a point where Reddit is cutting down the API, it will be a time to celebrate.
- gary_0 2y ago
  > Scraping old.reddit is quite easy, and getting rid of it altogether is not something that they are willing to do. Really? Unless there's an ironclad public statement to the contrary, the vibe I get from old.reddit is that it won't be long until the axe falls, especially since they are fine with "new" reddit features that malfunction in old.reddit. And I'd imagine their attitude towards unhappy users once they kill old.reddit will be the same as when they killed the API (which was "go fuck yourselves", to put it plainly).
  - rglullis 2y ago
    Maybe it was just my corner of Reddit, but last year when I was trying to convince people to move away. There were a good number of people who were just saying "I don't care about the API pricing changes because I just use old.reddit. If they do get rid of it, then I'll leave it right away." My feeling is that Reddit will continue to push and nudge people to new UI, but will not fully retire old. I think that if they ever do it it will be the final straw and mass migration will be inevitable.
    - immibis 2y ago
      New users always end up using the new version, and if they're new to the Internet they don't realize what they're missing. Old users contribute the most value, but it's not captured in shareholder- or management-visible statistics so they don't care and will drive them off to improve the statistics they do have (like ad impressions per page load). Thus old.reddit will die.

rglullis 2y ago

There are levels of survival we are prepared to accept... 1) A lot of Reddit's usefulness comes from the bots. If they shut down the API entirely, they would lose a lot of value which would accelerate their demise. 2) A more cynical person would say that without bots, Reddit would lose 30-40% of its "traffic", and that they can not afford to do that. This is why the current API is still quite generous. It's enough for most bots, but just too expensive for third-party clients. 3) Even if Reddit shut down its API tomorrow, the majority of interesting content has already been copied/archived. 4) Scraping old.reddit is quite easy, and getting rid of it altogether is not something that they are willing to do. All in all, I'd say that if we ever get to a point where Reddit is cutting down the API, it will be a time to celebrate.

gary_0 2y ago
> Scraping old.reddit is quite easy, and getting rid of it altogether is not something that they are willing to do. Really? Unless there's an ironclad public statement to the contrary, the vibe I get from old.reddit is that it won't be long until the axe falls, especially since they are fine with "new" reddit features that malfunction in old.reddit. And I'd imagine their attitude towards unhappy users once they kill old.reddit will be the same as when they killed the API (which was "go fuck yourselves", to put it plainly).
- rglullis 2y ago
  Maybe it was just my corner of Reddit, but last year when I was trying to convince people to move away. There were a good number of people who were just saying "I don't care about the API pricing changes because I just use old.reddit. If they do get rid of it, then I'll leave it right away." My feeling is that Reddit will continue to push and nudge people to new UI, but will not fully retire old. I think that if they ever do it it will be the final straw and mass migration will be inevitable.
  - immibis 2y ago
    New users always end up using the new version, and if they're new to the Internet they don't realize what they're missing. Old users contribute the most value, but it's not captured in shareholder- or management-visible statistics so they don't care and will drive them off to improve the statistics they do have (like ad impressions per page load). Thus old.reddit will die.