Reddit is one of the biggest and most important websites on the planet, especially since it’s one of the last places where humans can get questions answered by actual humans. So it sucks to see that the company is about to disrupt many of the best ways to really experience the whole thing.
For anyone using the desktop site, the Reddit experience is fine, I guess (“Old Reddit” is better), but on the phone it all changes. The official app of Reddit suckand is completely filled with intrusive advertising, meaning a lot of people rely on the work of third-party apps—such as the hugely popular Apollo on iOS and my own favorite, Infinity on Android— for browsing and commenting.
Or they did. Those third-party apps only exist because Reddit allows them to access their API (basically their backend); today, the website announced specific changes to that arrangement (first publicly announced last month), do data billing—similar to those introduced by another platform with popular third-party apps, Twitter—extraordinary, they will price every third party app out in the market.
The creator of Apollo did the math, And talk:
I’ll get straight to the point: 50 million requests cost $12,000, a much higher number than I could have imagined.
Apollo made 7 billion requests last month, which is about $1.7 million per month, or $20 million per year. Even if I only keep users subscribed, the average Apollo user uses 344 requests per day, which would cost $2.50 per month, more than double the current subscription cost, so I will be at a loss every month.
Meanwhile, one of the developers of RIF, another popular Android app, say Not only have they been discounted (if Apollo couldn’t afford it, no one would be able to afford it), but Reddit is also making a change where third-party apps will lose access to NSFW subreddits , while the official website does not:
Remove pornographic material from third-party apps while keeping said content in the official app. Some have speculated that the NSFW will leave Reddit altogether, but why did Reddit Inc recently extend NSFW upload support on their desktop site?
That is obvious that the price is too high, far beyond what these developers expect or can afford, not to make money. Not when it became clear that no one could pay. It is being brought in to crush third-party alternatives, directing every mobile user to the official app where they will have to view ads or pay for premium Reddit.
Or, you know, stop going to Reddit.
