[jfengel]

That unspoken contract is interesting. As I understand it, from Reddit's point of view, the contract was "We give you a place to a thing that you want to do, and will provide you storage space and bandwidth. In return, you give us the content you produce."

I imagine that this was, in fact, spoken -- in the terms of service. Not that anybody reads the terms of service (and I'm doubtful that any of them are really legally airtight).

It sounds as if users expected more, though I'm not sure what. Even as an unspoken contract, "free access forever" is a lot to ask. Those users can ditch Reddit, but I don't know if they'll find a (spoken) deal that's any better.

(Though I'm not sure why. Servers and bandwidth cost money, but not that much money.)