[batiudrami]

If it was just about AI scraping they could have given the third party reader apps a free pass on API fees.

The recorded phone calls from the Apollo developer have reddit agreeing with the dev’s suggestion that it is about the opportunity cost of having users using apps which are not easily monetised by reddit. Which is obvious to everyone so I don’t see why you’re pretending otherwise.

[user249]

> apps which are not easily monetised by reddit

I don't see a lot of difference between reddit apps and AI companies.

Why do you pretend that apps should make money off reddit data without paying for it? Just because they did in the past doesn't mean they have to keep doing it now that everyone has realized it's a valuable commodity.

[piva00]

You are probably very aware that the main issue the app developers have is not about paying for access or not, it's how heavy handed and in short notice the demand for payment from Reddit came.

The 3rd party developers were very clear they were willing to figure out a way to pay for API access, it's just impossible to do it when you have 30 days notice to start being liable for a US$ 20m/year bill...

[labrador]

That's capitalism for you. I also don't like the brutality of it, but it seems to the most efficient system at creating wealth

[piva00]

Could you expand on what's capitalistic about being a dick to 3rd party apps?

As a platform you can monetise that, turning it into wealth, the value is already there. These users prefer the experience of the platform provided by someone else than Reddit. In my mind, if principles of capitalism were in play here, and Reddit is well managed, they would find an efficient way to make money out of value that's already being delivered. Forcing apps to shutdown won't be doing that.

The current move is just a dick move with the potential to make Reddit less valuable than before, I do not understand what principle of capitalism states that this specific brutality is efficient at creating wealth.

[labrador]

> being a dick to 3rd party apps

You're making it personal, when it's business, not personal.

> users prefer the experience of the platform provided by someone else

Maybe reddit will buy the app that people like so they can monetize it

> Forcing apps to shutdown won't be doing that

Reddit is not forcing apps to shutdown. They are asking them to pay market value for the data

> I do not understand what principle of capitalism states that this specific brutality is efficient at creating wealth.

Reddit data is a commodity whose price is set by buyers and sellers. If your business depends on the price of a commodity being under a certain price and that price goes up and your business fails, that sounds like capitalism to me. Reddit has discovered that the value of their data has gone up with the arrival of AI and are asking people to pay accordingly. If you go out of business then you are among the first casualties of AI, , with many to follow. It's time to rethink your business model.

[piva00]

> You're making it personal, when it's business, not personal.

Spez made it personal, saying that Apollo's developer was extorting Reddit while it was absolutely untrue. This is not business, this is being a dick. It became personal when slander comes into play from the CEO...

> Maybe reddit will buy the app that people like so they can monetize it

Reddit did that with Alien Blue and... Killed the app, simple as that, they bought it with the promise they would integrate the experience that made people prefer Alien Blue to their official app and it didn't happen, Reddit simply killed it. Why do you think they would purchase yet-another-client? You're entering baseless speculation territory.

> Reddit is not forcing apps to shutdown. They are asking them to pay market value for the data

If Reddit wasn't forcing apps to shutdown they would give more than 30 days notice for a massive API change, I know that, I work with public APIs at my employer, serving 10s to 100s of millions of MAU through our API. If there is any change about pricing, formats, anything that would affect our 3rd party integrations we need to prepare with ample time to allow them to migrate.

If Reddit was really trying to monetise their API they'd discuss with the current large users of this API what the path forward looks like, enter into negotiations, Reddit wouldn't want to lose this value that already exists there. What they did is nothing like that, they gave 3rd party developers 30 days notice and after that you can be on the hook for US$ 20 million/year if you are a large enough app... This is not capitalism, this is killing apps because they don't know how to monetise it (or they know and it will take very long for this to show up in their IPO metrics and they want these metrics right now). There are a gazillion ideas on how to actually make those apps become another revenue stream, none of the good ideas include "30 days notice and after that you're on the hook for a massive usage bill".

> Reddit data is a commodity whose price is set by buyers and sellers. If your business depends on the price of a commodity being under a certain price and that price goes up and your business fails, that sounds like capitalism to me. Reddit has discovered that the value of their data has gone up with the arrival of AI and are asking people to pay accordingly. If you go out of business then you are among the first casualties of AI, , with many to follow. It's time to rethink your business model.

This is only true if AI is getting data through APIs, AI is getting data from the public web, from scraping, there are multiple datasources of scraped websites, you can even create your own scraper and go your merry way collecting Reddit's data. It does not explain the pay-to-play move, if I want Reddit's data I don't need their API, it's a website open to the public...

And I'm telling you that because I'm involved with initiatives around that at my employer, the only way that API limiting works against AI is if your data is not available generally in the web (like Facebook's).