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Reddit CEO Steve Huffman is hosting an AMA (ask me anything) session later today, at around 10:30 AM PT / 1:30 PM ET / 5:30 PM GMT. He will take questions about “the latest API updates, including accessibility, mod bots, and third-party mod tools”. This comes amid a massive public outrage over the company’s new API policy that it announced in April.
Reddit is under fire for its new API policy
Tensions are running high at Reddit lately. The company’s decision to start charging for its APIs understandably hasn’t gone down well with indie developers. While the plan is to monetize the data the platform has accumulated in the 18 years of its existence, the money it’s charging developers is reportedly way too high. So much so that even the biggest third-party Reddit apps are unable to bear the cost. Many of them are shutting down at the end of this month, including Apollo, ReddPlanet, Sync, and Reddit is Fun.
On the other hand, the Reddit community has announced a mass protest against this controversial decision. More than 3,000 subreddits have confirmed that they will go dark for at least 48 hours beginning this Monday, June 12th. These include some big subreddits such as r/music, r/pics, r/gaming, r/todayilearned, and r/aww, all of which have more than 30 million subscribers. As you can see in this list (and this), a lot of big subreddits are going dark next week in protest against the company (via).
Amid all this, Reddit has mostly remained mum. All it has said is that accessibility-focused apps will continue to get free access to its APIs. Unsurprisingly, developers have accused the company of showing no support or cooperation towards them. “Reddit has made it clear that I’m not welcome here,” said the ReddPlanet developer. “Reddit’s behavior has been so appalling that for any developer I’ve talked to, it’s completely erased the indication that they even want us around,” the Apollo developer added.
Reddit CEO will discuss these API updates in an AMA session later today
After weeks of mass outrage on the platform, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman is finally addressing the community publicly later today. Considering the current environment, this AMA session may not be a fun conversation between a company’s CEO and its users. Reddit avoided mentioning “third-party apps” among the topics Huffman will take questions on during the AMA session. But he may have to field plenty of questions about these apps. It remains to be seen whether Reddit announces any changes to keep third-party apps alive.
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