this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2023
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Hello everyone, I’ll try to keep this short as I know there’s been a lot going on over the last few days. When we made our announcement last week, we intended to get Reddit's attention on a subject that our team found extremely concerning. /r/Videos is joining a larger coordinated protest and signing an open letter to the admins found here.

The announcement was of exceedingly high API prices which we all know was to intentionally kill 3rd party applications on reddit (Apollo, Reddit is Fun, Boost, Relay, etc.) Since that post several things have become clear; Reddit is not willing to listen to its users or the mod teams from many of its largest communities on this matter. Yesterday all major third-party Reddit apps announced that they would be shutting down on the 30th of June due to these changes. There were no negotiations and Reddit refused to extend the deadlines. The rug was pulled out from under them and by extension all of the users who rely on those tools to use reddit.

In addition to this, the AMA hosted by Steve Huffman, CEO of Reddit, which was intended to alleviate concerns held by many users about these issues, was nothing short of a collage of inappropriate responses. There are many things to take away from this AMA but here are the key points. Most disappointingly it appears that Reddit outright misconstrued the actions of Apollo's creator /u/iamthatis by saying that he threatened Reddit and leaked private phone calls, something done only to clear his name of another accusation.

So what’s happening? The TL;DR? Effective tomorrow (6/11/2023), /r/Videos will be restricting posting capabilities. Anything posted before the cut off date will likely be the final front page of our community before we go private indefinitely. In the unlikely scenario that Reddit ownership has a sudden change of heart and capitulates on their decisions we will reopen, but until that happens /r/Videos will stay closed. Many other communities have come to similar decisions and we support those who have decided to take a stand.

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[–] mobyduck648@beehaw.org 83 points 1 year ago

Good on the mod team of /r/videos! It must have been a difficult decision to walk away from a 26M+ sized community but I think it's definitely better to scuttle the ship and go down with it than capitulate at this point. This is a bold choice that's left Reddit between a rock and a hard place.

[–] imkmiaw@lemmy.fmhy.ml 82 points 1 year ago (15 children)

I honestly think more subs need to do an indefinite shut down.

If it's only for 48 hours Reddit can just wait it out, and if not a lot of subs join in on the indefinite shut down they can just replace the mods for new ones.

However, in my opinion, the buggest change will come June 30th when 3rd party apps shut down since that's when users will actualy stop using Reddit.

Let's hope it's enough users to make a change. I myself will be deleting everything and my account on June 30th. Let's hope something changes.

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[–] HandOfKarma@kbin.social 65 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This is huge news! Hopefully other gigantic subreddits will follow suit.

[–] sup@lemmy.ca 38 points 1 year ago (5 children)

Yup this is massive and it's not a niche subreddit. That means, most likely, more will follow. Sure, reddit will probably force it back online with new mods or whatever, but THIS is how you make a statement. Hat's off r/videos!

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[–] bdonvr@lemmy.rogers-net.com 60 points 1 year ago (4 children)

I still think the admin team will forcefully takeover and reopen the big subs, but I think that'll be like pouring gasoline on that dumpster fire.

[–] satouru@beehaw.org 41 points 1 year ago (15 children)

I’m pretty sure that’s what’s going to happen too.

They’ll kick dissident mods out, install their own, and just reopen the subs like nothing happened. There’s precedent of that happening I believe (although for much more reasonable reasons, like mods going rogue for stupid or anti-free speech stuff).

And it’s going to be an absolute shitshow. I feel sad, but I also kind of love it. You reap what you sow, I guess.

[–] aaronbieber@kbin.social 31 points 1 year ago (3 children)

If they force a reopen, we should all get ready to post Never Gonna Give You Up music videos all day long.

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[–] anthoniix@beehaw.org 55 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Burn everthing down and rebuild in the fediverse. FUCK these corporations.

[–] Jdreben@beehaw.org 27 points 1 year ago

This is the way

[–] howdy@thesimplecorner.org 51 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

Absolutely incredible to see. Very happy that one of biggest subs called reddits bluff. Which I believe is where we are. Reddit thinks the users that actually care about 3rd party apps will move on at this point and reddit will have the everyone else switch to their apps with no more of a thought than swiping up to the next tik tok video. I'm deleting my last account on Reddit now in solidarity. Lemmy and the fediverse feels nice. I am in near complete control of my data running my own instance while still being able to interact with literally everyone I want and don't want. My ublock isn't blocking a single thing, no trackers, no more being a commodity. Already fine communities are springing up with thoughtful moderation, rules and inclusivity.

I am super excited about what is happening here.

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[–] runarskoll@beehaw.org 50 points 1 year ago (2 children)

For me it's a double sided problem. Even if reddit solves the moderation tools problem which user the api (and they will because those are the tools of the free labor they explore) there will be still the problem with the user experience. Even if subreddits reopen I will never use the official reddit app, the same way I refuse to use the official twitter app since apps like Falcon Pro, Flamingo or Talon stopped working.

Reddit CEO can bargain the deal he wants that I don't care anymore. For me reddit is now only a repository where I will continue to search specific information. It is no more a place where I want to participate in online communities.

[–] heartburn@beehaw.org 29 points 1 year ago (3 children)

That was my line of thought as well, however...

Reddit will stop being a good information repo very quickly as users ~~who actually know what they're talking about~~ leave and the information stops being up to date. The trend of adding "reddit" to every google search will die out soon.

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[–] kherge@beehaw.org 49 points 1 year ago (8 children)

I appreciate the effort, but since this is one of the main subreddits the Reddit admins will simply purge these subreddits of their mods, install new ones, and reopen it (they’ve already done something like this before).

The real question is how well will the sub operate then? I imagine not very well since all of the experienced mods and their tools are gone.

[–] Lycan@beehaw.org 29 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

This was my immediate reaction too. Reddit will likely replace the current moderator team of r/videos and reopen. Nonetheless I can appreciate and respect the gesture/message.

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[–] Rat@lemmy.world 48 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This is great to hear! Unfortunately the reddit exodus will likely splinter a bunch of niche communities, but it will definitely be for the best. I'm all down for the "de-consolidation" of the internet!

[–] ghostalmedia@beehaw.org 36 points 1 year ago (24 children)

The tricky thing will be the small niche communities that are already hosted on Reddit. For example, there is a group of us dorks who are really into home automation with HomeKit. I'd hate for that small group to splinter into smaller groups that are so small that they're no longer a good source of collective knowledge.

I don't really have a great solve for that problem, but as someone who does experience and service design by trade, I've found this to be a fun puzzle to marinate on over the past few weeks.

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[–] SmugBedBug@sh.itjust.works 45 points 1 year ago (8 children)

Wow! I didn't expect something like this from such a big subreddit. I expect the admins will just take it over though.

Depending on how many other subreddits do this, they won't be able to run all of them on their own.

[–] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 30 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Admins may take it over, but a big default sub like that has a big moderation team, and they are all volunteers. I expect the admins won't be able to find suitable replacements to match the level of free labour they've been getting

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[–] makingStuffForFun@lemmy.ml 29 points 1 year ago (5 children)

The admins will take over all the high profile subs. You know it

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[–] blitzen@lemmy.ca 45 points 1 year ago

I’d like to see the big subs each create an official mastodon account for the sole purpose of announcing trustworthy information. One the subs come back up, especially if it’s earlier than expected, how will we know if they were taken over by the admins?

[–] terribleplan@lemmy.nrd.li 45 points 1 year ago (3 children)

indefinitely != permanently

[–] fernandofig@beehaw.org 26 points 1 year ago

It's not pedantic. There IS a difference, and it's relevant in this case.

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[–] Crigz@kbin.social 44 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'm already feeling at home on kbin. Really liking this fediverse stuff! I don't think I'm going to miss reddit at all.

[–] alternativeninja@lemmy.sdf.org 50 points 1 year ago (4 children)

I think the neat thing is while you're on KBin, I'm on Lemmy and we can still interact. I just wish it was easer to understand for the non tech savvy people. It's going to make adoption by the mainstream hard

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[–] LemmyAtem@beehaw.org 36 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Thanks for grabbing the text, that's very helpful. Good for /r/videos, way to send a strong message.

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[–] Moneymunkie@beehaw.org 35 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Good god I knew it wasn't going to go well but I didn't think they'd crash and burn it THIS bad.

The bar was on the floor and they still managed to somehow clip underneath it through the floor, end up in some backrooms-esque dimension only to trip on a banana peel and land face first in a pie.

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[–] laxe@lemmy.ca 35 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I commend the shutdown but if things get out of hand reddit admins will take over the popular subs. They won’t let a prime sub get shut down by mods.

[–] saigot@lemmy.ca 29 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I think there may not be enough competent volunteer mods to take it over. They could replace them with paid reddit employees like other big platforms but that's gonna cost them more than the 20mil a year they apparently think 3rd party apps are costing them.

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[–] polaroid@beehaw.org 34 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Tsk tsk, reddit...

Man, why does everything I like have to go to hell?

[–] flying_gerbil@beehaw.org 34 points 1 year ago (3 children)

How long before reddit replaces the mods and reopens it? I give it a day or two after the 48 hour blackout

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[–] AllBetsAreOff@beehaw.org 33 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

Man it's just so wild to watch what's going on over there right now. Even when subreddits come back after a couple days it may not matter if bot-assisted moderation becomes impossible over there in the long run.

If reddit backs off enough to save the accessibility and moderation issues, I hope enough people still leave to help create a strong alternate ecosystem.

If alternatives like this site had existed through previous years, I don't think Reddit could have survived a lot of its previous mistakes.

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[–] Senseibull@lemmy.ml 32 points 1 year ago
[–] Aninjanameddaryll@sopuli.xyz 29 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I took r/edc restricted yesterday, though we are/were tiny. While I still plan to find replacement mods from within the community after reddit goes full dipshit, I'm done ring their work for free, with shit tools, next to zero support, and (worse, imo) taking a lot of flak from admins because of bullshit unrelated to moderation.

I dunno if lemmy is going to become the reddit replacement or not, but I'm done with giving reddit anything at all. Overwrote and deleted everything from my author account that had some decent amount of fiction, and my personal account that had a lot of real stories from my life. That ain't much, but since I've seen my stuff being read on YouTube, and reposted by the copy/paste bots, it's something I guess.

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[–] worfamerryman@beehaw.org 29 points 1 year ago (8 children)

What other subs are going private inefinitely?

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[–] jack@lemmy.world 25 points 1 year ago (8 children)

I think any and all subreddits should go this way.

Reddit is only popular because of the users. We create the content. Yes, a lot of posts on the website are external links but all discussions are generated and concluded by us, the users.

Shutting subs down for 1-2 days and going back to normal is not going to have much of an impact. It's akin to a server blip. If subs shut down indefinitely then reddit has a real problem. 'Normal' users will start to take notice, whereas they currently might not be paying much attention. These subs should go the other route. Shut down and promote alternatives (such as lemmy!) to divert traffic away from reddit.

Pigboy Spez talked about not being profitable. No shit, you dick. This is how you become even less profitable, by pissing off the entire user base.

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