It’s been over a month now since Reddit became worldwide news following the a mass community revolt against the company over its decision to price out API-dependent apps (and thereby killing the competition). Thousands of Reddits, including many MMORPG ones, went dark for days and even weeks, with some returning only via the most passive-aggressive acts of civil disobedience possible.
Since then, some subreddits have quietly gone back to business as usual (some with forcefully removed moderators) while others remain hot messes, including the NSFW varieties. But there’s still a strong spirit of anger and rebellion aimed at Reddit’s stubborn CEO and management, as evidenced by the newly returned r/place turning into an artistic protest of its own.
Reddit VP of Community Go_JasonWaterfalls, whose real name Reddit declined to give Ars Technica, penned a post to the community publicly acknowledging the imbroglio; he or she said, “[W]e’ve all had a… time on Reddit lately and I’m here to recognize it, acknowledge that our relationship has been tested, and begin the ‘now what?’ conversation.” Part of that conversation, apparently, is hosting twice-a-week moderator feedback sessions with the company. But with no real concessions being made by the company over API changes and its brute-force tactics used against rebels, the community isn’t really having it.
“Moderators are a vital part of Reddit. You are leaders and stewards of your communities,” the company’s representative said, to which a moderator replied, “Your CEO called us Landed Gentry.” Another mod noted, “If your CEO thinks we don’t matter, why are you surprised that we don’t think we matter to you? Reddit lies and ignores us all the time. This isn’t new. Stop pretending Reddit is going to listen to us now.”
Maybe this should be posted in r/oohthatburns?
