The really really sad thing is, Reddit could have done a half decent job and made a fair bit of money, but they decided on stupidity instead.
Sure, it would have upset some people a bit, but... Not by anywhere close to the same degree.
Alright, we're sorry, but use of the API is going to have to start costing money for some kinds of uses.
First off, people that just want to scrape everything get the following access, and a much higher rate limit, but it's going to cost $x.
Moderator tools will always be free, but the API will require that the tool be associated with a moderator, and it will only permit access to subs that the user is a moderator for.
Community bots will generally be free, subject to the following restrictions.
And 3rd party clients will be charged a minimal amount, calculated to be roughly equal to what we are making from similar users on the official clients, to make up for lost ad revenue. Alternate options involving profit sharing may be viable, contact X for details.
By accepting the API agreement, you agree that use of the wrong class of API usage (for example, using the community bot or 3rd party client classes for data scraping) will be billed, retroactively, at $X * 10.
There. That's really not that hard. And people would have been much less upset at that, at least as long as the fees were actually as described, and not based on, say, how much they would like to make per user.
You'd probably want a free tier for 3rd party clients for users of specific account types. If the user is paying for Reddit Premium, maybe 3rd party clients don't get charged for API usage for that user account. Or if the user is a moderator for a given subreddit, API usage for that user on that subreddit is also free. With an API that the client can use to check the status of such things. If they were smart, they would also have a process for users with disabilities to have their accounts exempted from fees. That last one is hard, because you need a verification process, but it would get them a lot of good will.
Again... This shouldn't be hard. And it would have turned into a viable revenue stream!
Hell, flatly disclose that the 3rd party cost is 30% more than the average cost of using the standard client, to support the effort required to maintain the API. (Largely bullshit, but it makes those users more valuable than those that use the official client, while not being expensive enough to make it impossible for anyone to offer a 3rd party client at an even remotely sane cost.)
Yes, this would have very sadly been the end of free 3rd party clients... But I for one would have been... Okay with paying a small amount per month/year through the app store for a client that didn't suck.
Instead, Reddit decided that committing suicide was the better path forward.
Gaming, news, tech, general literature. All of these are somewhat thriving, with a steady influx of posts and comments. At the same time, the userbase is sorely lacking for more niche communities. In my case it'd be stuff like poetry, yoga, religion, linguistics, meditation. Or many other communities I'd doubt they'd form a...
On top of that, we can't expect communities to POOF into existence.
We have to be part of them to build them, which means making them if they don't exist yet as well as posting and commenting in the ones that do exist. I hope that people who are used to lurking on Reddit will go out of their comfort zone a bit and start to participate in fediverse communities so that we can build things up more quickly.
Think about things from the point of view of someone who has never used Reddit or the fediverse, but you've heard about them both from recent news articles and want to see what they are about....
I appreciate the concern, and it seems to me that kbin is no longer just one person ;) Currently, kbin is a team of wonderful people who handle development work, devops, project management, and more. Additionally, Piotr helps me with administering kbin.social. There will be significant changes here soon, things are happening quickly. But to be honest, I wasn't fully prepared for such substantial growth, and it will probably take some time before everything stabilizes. But... this is just the beginning ;) What's important is that the snowball starts rolling, regardless of whether kbin, Lemmy, or Mastodon gains the most users. We all win in this situation.
This is the Reddit app. They are making it really easy to want to migrate ( lemmy.world )
cross-posted from: lemmy.world/post/1032247
Reddit threatens the mods of r/CyberpunkGame (the main subreddit for Cyberpunk 2077). Mods decide to go down in a blaze of glory, whole sub agrees. ( old.reddit.com )
Surprising nobody, Reddit Corp threatening a gaming sub of a fanatically anti-corporate video game doesn't go as they'd hoped....
Fraud justice: Decision based on a fake case showcases the Supreme Court's illegitimacy ( www.salon.com )
Far-right lawyers created a phony "victim" in made-up case — and the justice with the stolen seat wrote the opinion
While larger, more general communities are thriving on the Fediverse - I'm missing out on the niche communities ( kbin.social )
Gaming, news, tech, general literature. All of these are somewhat thriving, with a steady influx of posts and comments. At the same time, the userbase is sorely lacking for more niche communities. In my case it'd be stuff like poetry, yoga, religion, linguistics, meditation. Or many other communities I'd doubt they'd form a...
PSA: while upvoting exists, to get the "move closer to the top" effect that reddit's upvote had, you need to click boost ( kbin.social )
a small difference, but important to how people use the site
Fediverse won't replace Reddit as long as Lemmy is the main platform being promoted ( kbin.social )
Think about things from the point of view of someone who has never used Reddit or the fediverse, but you've heard about them both from recent news articles and want to see what they are about....
Fuck Reddit u̶p̶v̶o̶t̶e̶ boost party! ( kbin.social )
The apps have all gone offline, welcome aboard to all the other refugees, fuck /u/spez!