Reddit Blackout: CEO Claims It Will Be Over Soon

How long will Reddit go on strike? If the CEO has his way, not for long. (Image: Unsplash / Markus Spiske / Reddit)

The folks behind Reddit have had to justify their new pricing policy lately. While users are allowed to continue using Reddit for free, developers of third-party apps, such as Apollo, have to pay extra to keep them running. It’s millions of dollars a year.

To support the developers, thousands of subreddits have announced a blackout. There Plan: From June 12th to June 14th, no new content will appear in the “striking” communities.

In an internal note to Reddit employees sent out Monday afternoon, CEO Steve Huffman addressed the recent negative reactions to the company.

He asked the staff to Noise and emphasized that the current blackout of thousands of subreddits will eventually pass. The Verge claims to have received the memo from unspecified sources.

On the other hand, the blackout is being extended by many subreddits.

The memo promises confidence

Huffman emphasizes that the blackout does not significant sales impact and that the company expects many of the subreddits to come back online today. He says:

Additionally, Huffman warns employees not to wear Reddit products in public, as anger over the API price changes could make them a target for frustrated users.

He also emphasizes the need to achieve the planned goals and improve the product. In the short term, important releases of mod tools are pending, which must be successfully implemented.

Blackout indefinitely

Over 8,000 Reddit communities have gone temporarily offline in protest, and while many plan or have planned to come back online today, some have said they will remain private until Reddit makes the API more cost-effective.

You can follow the status of the blackout live on Twitch.

In the live stream “reddark_247” there is an overview of the subreddits that have “gone dark”. As of now (June 14, 11:30 a.m.), around 7,000 of the original 8,000 are still involved in the strike.

The stream also calls on moderators to keep the subreddits closed. Users should vote to continue participating in the blackout. At the moment, many places are voting on whether to go live again or not.

Huffmanns Memo

As previously mentioned, The Verge allegedly received a copy of the memo and published it as well. We translated Steve Huffmann’s message into German for you:

»Hello Snoos,

As of last night, about a thousand subreddits are private. We expect many of them to return by Wednesday; many have already announced this. We knew something like this was coming our way. Nevertheless, this is a challenge. We have a lot of work ahead of us. A number of Snoos have been working around the clock, adapting to infrastructure stresses, engaging with communities and responding to the myriad issues surrounding this blackout. Thank you team

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So far we haven’t seen any significant impact on revenue and we will continue to monitor developments.

There’s a lot of noise in this case. Louder than ever before. Our teams are working on it, and like all turmoil on Reddit, this one will pass. The most important thing we can do now is stay focused, face challenges and keep moving forward. It is imperative that we deliver what we promised. The only long-term solution is to improve our product. In the near term we need to release a few critical mod tools.

While the two largest third-party apps, Apollo and RIF, along with a few others, have announced that they will be discontinued by the end of the month, we are still in talks with a few others. And as I mentioned in my post last week, we will exempt accessible applications and have agreements with RedReader and Dystopia so far.

I’m sorry to say this, but please be careful when wearing Reddit clothing in public. Some people are really upset. We don’t want you to be a target for these people.

Again, we’ll do it. Thank you all for your support.«

Do you use Reddit regularly? Are you joining the strike or are you already looking for the subreddits that are open again? Write it to us in the comments!