[randomdata]

> They knew no app was going to pay those astronomical rates

Perhaps, but they don't have much choice. If the apps paid a reasonable rate with respect to what is reasonable to app developers, Reddit would still go bankrupt. May as well go big and go bankrupt only if that fails then not try and be guaranteed to go bankrupt.

Thing is, Apollo is on board to pay the big price, but Christian has exclaimed he needs more time to make the necessary changes to support it. Problem is that Reddit doesn't have that much time. Bankruptcy is still inevitable on his needed timeline. The power company doesn't care that you plan to make money sometime in the future when developers have had time to get around to making changes to their software. They want their money when they want it and if you can't make good then and there, that's it.

Remember, they're panicking. Their old model of finding new investment every time the plug was about to be pulled is dead and they weren't expecting that. They need legitimate cashflow now and don't know where else to find it on short notice.

Next will be a massive layoff to follow the small layoff earlier this week to address the haemorrhaging on the expense side. The "everything will be okay in a few days" notice sent to employees today indicates that something "not okay" is coming.

[johnnyanmac]

>If the apps paid a reasonable rate with respect to what is reasonable to app developers, Reddit would still go bankrupt.

I know reddit was never profitable, but I'm not convinced Reddit is so short on money that they can't last to 2024. They'd probably do major layoffs like so much of the tech industry has this deal and lighten that load. From what I heard, Reddit employs 2000 workers and I can't imagine they need that many to keep the site operational (For reference, Twitter had ~4k employees pre-pandemic, and peaked at 7500 employees... I'm not convinced that Reddit's site complexity is a quarter of the largest site in the world, despite reddit having plenty of traffic as a top site itself).

[randomdata]

> They'd probably do major layoffs like so much of the tech industry has this deal and lighten that load.

Yes, that is addressed at the end. 'Next will be a massive layoff to follow the small layoff earlier this week to address the haemorrhaging on the expense side. The "everything will be okay in a few days" notice sent to employees today indicates that something "not okay" is coming.'

You don't want to start there if you don't have to. If they can turn things around there is still the possibility of IPO. Current investors have made it clear that they want off the sinking ship. Only staving off bankruptcy by trimming the workforce to the bare minimum is not a good look for the sake of IPO, however. That is saved for the last ditch effort.

[johnnyanmac]

>You don't want to start there if you don't have to.

Of course (I was laid off last month, no dev wishes other devs to be laid off). But to open up my cynical side for a bit: I also don't sympathize with these huge companies taking advantage of (what EVERYONE knew was) a temporary boon in tech and growing off of low interest rates proportions that would not be needed in 2-3 years.

I as an individual saved aggressively for when that bubble inevitably popped and I'd very likely be laid off (fears which came true. Twice.). These companies instead decided to throw all bets in, and I can't exactly sympathize when the obvious future called their bluff. If Reddit didn't have a war chest to help wheather the storm with, I just see that as myopic at best and greedy at worst.

[randomdata]

> I also don't sympathize with these huge companies taking advantage of (what EVERYONE knew was) a temporary boon in tech

While perhaps there is an argument to be made that one can take advantage of another if there is information asymmetry, when you say that EVERYONE recognized the temporary nature of the engagement, to think that temporary hiring under that is taking advantage of a worker is quite silly. A worker needing a guarantee of x number of years of payment had every right to demand it be written into the contract.

> These companies instead decided to throw all bets in

Of course, so did the workers. They didn't have to leave their jobs flipping burgers. They chose to because they saw $$$ in the air. That same greed is no doubt, as before, why they didn't bother putting any conditions in the contract to protect themselves from the downturn you state they knew was coming. They took a chance – sometimes it worked out, other times it didn't. Such is the nature of risk.

[johnnyanmac]

>A worker needing a guarantee of x number of years of payment had every right to demand it be written into the contract.

To be frank: if you're at that level of negotiation in your contracting, you are either a business owner yourself, or are some of the best of the industry who probably isn't financially worried about a downturn. The latter doesn't have any benefit from chaining themselves to a company. I don't even think contracted workers are safe since many contracts were broken over this.

For the other 99.99% of hourly/salary workers in the US, trying to negotiate specific terms in an at-will state will only end with you being crossed off the hire list.

>They didn't have to leave their jobs flipping burgers.

Sure they did. They were laid off from there too:

https://nypost.com/2023/04/07/mcdonalds-lays-off-hundreds-cu...

I know you were being coy, but every sector of almost every industry is doing this. There is no safe place except for already being rich and not having to worry about years of salary.

Maybe you're not from the US, but it seems you don't understand how US employment works. I'll reiterate: the US is almost all "at will states". It gives freedom in that at any time an employee can walk away (well, almost any time. Funny how that works), but employers can also fire you for any reason unrelated to being a protected class (minority, pregnant, gay, etc.). There is never any safety net guaranteed in the US.

[randomdata]

> For the other 99.99% of hourly/salary workers in the US, trying to negotiate specific terms in an at-will state will only end with you being crossed off the hire list.

That's fine. You just said that anything else in the given scenario would have you being taken advantage of, so you would want the agreement to be rejected if they cannot commit to those terms.

Remember, this is, in the end, no different than the earlier suggestion that if all a company sees is a short-term hiring opportunity during a temporary boom that they should not hire at all. The long-term job you want doesn't exist either way. You haven't lost anything.

> I'll reiterate: the US is almost all "at will states".

Sure. And I'll reiterate that you can negotiate your own contractual terms. Yes, that does mean some people won't want to work with you, but that's okay because why would you want to work for someone that is taking advantage of you?

To recognize a bad deal upfront, accept it anyway, and then cry foul later is nonsensical.