They did that not to (primarily) kill 3PA, but to get money from people who scrape data for AI datasets.
Although I think they could’ve just specified this in their ToS…
Reddit corporate is not very smart. Never was.
Spez and his mates had proven way back in the early 10s that they had the mindset and attitude of 4chan troll teenagers, despite being business-owning adults.
hell they could have bought the 3rd party apps and hired the devs
They did that once. Bought the best app in town, butchered it, and now we’re here.
I think they view it as ripping off the bandaid now before their IPO. They probably figured they would lose some single digit % of users that would recover over time, and now they will have full control over the experience with no 3rd party apps, which they will want in order to squeeze more money over time.
I always thought requiring premium for 3rd party apps would have been the best and easiest move for essentially no actual work.
