### About Community Tracking and helping #redditmigration to Kbin and the Fediverse. Say hello to the decentralized and open future. To see latest reeddit blackout info, see here: https://reddark.untone.uk/
This just in from forbes.com:
"Investors are fed up. Fidelity, which led Reddit’s $700 million funding round in 2021 with a $10 billion valuation, has cut its Reddit company valuation by 41% since it invested. This could scupper Reddit’s plans to eventually go public with a reported valuation of $15 billion."
Who actually loses a game of chicken of this magnitude?!? u/spez, you listening?!?
The app owners will work with him to prevent AI training from taking data from the site for free. And any issues the third party apps have doing that will be shared by the official app. They're not special in that regard. You can't really have public secrets behind a paywall. It doesn't really work.
There are many, many options here that are only being held back by Huffman's ego. Imagine losing billions in valuation because of personal ego. I bet investors are thrilled.
Isn’t it entertaining to watch?!! I’ve gone through a few bags of popcorn over the course of the last few days🍿🍿
that's one thing I still remember after all of this. Popcorn still tastes good
"ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?" - Huffman, probably
It's not just his ego but also his incompetence which has been very apparent for his entire tenure. I really don't get how they've be never managed to find someone who's up to the job.
Maybe he’ll be eligible for beers with Elon now.
I thought ais used web crawlers, not apis to get their data
Getting info out of an API is generally easier, because it will always give you data in a format that's easy to parse.
But all this will probably see more web crawling bots crop up
I’m not surprised that Fidelity is losing faith in Reddit. The way Steve completely alienated the whole community, well he's basically shooting himself in the foot.
Also he admitted they don't make money and said they need to be profit driven til they do.
To me that says he's not sure this will actually make Reddit profitable; so looking at it from a detached, "I just care about the money" perspective I'd be really nervous about investing in Reddit. Feels like Spez would just light it all on fire.
They really need someone competent at the helm.
Competence runs a distant second to “trustable” at this point. Spez has shown he can’t be trusted.
Wait until he starts retroactively editing posts and/or deleting and shadowbanning against mutinous mods. I really hope the blackout keeps rolling a week or two and they see their ad rev and user impressions tank.
Spez already said they aren't changing their minds. And by the time the realize they might want to, it's going to be too late.
I posted about kbin.social in a comment thread from RIF and saw my comment posted, but when I checked under my profile the next day, the comment was gone. Not deleted by mods or reddit....just gone, like it never existed.
This was shortly after reddit banned the kbin subreddit for "spamming".
First time something like that has ever happened in the 10+ years I've been on there. Pretty much cemented my decision to stay away unless major changes happen.
u/spez, you listening?!?
Clearly he hasn't for even a brief moment.
Note that this cut in valuation has nothing to do with the blackout. It's actually old news. Forbes did mention it in their most recent article, but the majority of the drop in valuation was last year.
https://techcrunch.com/2023/06/01/fidelity-reddit-valuation/
Fidelity, the lead investor in Reddit’s most recent funding round in 2021, has slashed the estimated worth of its equity stake in the popular social media platform by 41% since the investment.
Fidelity Blue Chip Growth Fund’s stake in Reddit was valued at $16.6 million as of April 28, according to the fund’s monthly disclosure released over the weekend. That’s down 41.1% cumulatively since August 2021 when the asset manager spent $28.2 million to acquire the Reddit shares, according to disclosures the firm has made in its annual and semi-annual reports. […]
The substantial markdown of Reddit’s value by Fidelity predominantly occurred by the previous year. Nevertheless, it merits pointing out that Fidelity has persistently implemented minor reductions in the worth of Reddit’s shares in the ensuing months.
correct but the drop in valuation is what spurred the API fees and subsequent backlash. This will cause valuation to drop further.
Quote is from today's piece here https://www.forbes.com/sites/qai/2023/06/13/redditors-go-to-war-with-the-company-as-it-enforces-eye-watering-prices-for-reddit-api/
It is ALL about the Blackout...
No. I mentioned that:
Forbes did mention it in their most recent article, but the majority of the drop in valuation was last year.
The "new" valuation, 41% lower than their investment, was announced in April 2023.
The blackout may pass but the third-party developers and power users of the community have already been shown they're not valued. Not sure there's much Reddit can do to make those who left come back. Even if they give developers more time and a price reduction what's to say they won't go back on their word.
"There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again.” -George W. Bush
I don't even feel affected by the app changes. But I'm not comfortable in general staying there, seeing what they are doing and will keep doing to their people.
Even if the subs come back online, I won't be back unless changes are made, which it appears there won't be. On to greener pastures (kbin)!
I am at the point where I think, Reddit may well bounce back in general, for there are lots of people whose only experience of the web is using huge corpo-sites, but I still won't be there except for the cases where I have to use it for some crazy reason. The Fediverse feels a lot more hopeful and open, like the web was in the early days, and I much prefer that to the monolithic corporate site system. So wherever possible, I will pass on that.
The Fediverse is far from flawless, but maybe it'll fix its issues over time. Let's find out.
I remember Digg saying the same thing.
I guess this is the new Reddit! Time to kick our feet up.
I expected as much. 2 days is a pitiful protest length. I will not be using Reddit any longer whilst keeping an eye on updates from here and other news sites. I'm hoping this memo encourages all subreddits to protest idnefinitely until this assclown of a CEO is willing to negotiate lower API prices. And if he's not, onto greener pastures. And watching /r/wallstreetbets figure out a way to destroy their IPO when it eventually launches.
I agree i'm in no hurry to use Reddit. I'll be satisfied if enough people stick around and keep the place interesting. In fact i would say sticking around the fediverse is the only answer to dystopic corporate domination. Those who return, enjoy your exploitation, lol.
Me too. I am actually not missing reddit right now, but I don't know what I'll do when search results point me to reddit.
That's what's killing me. Problem solving without reddit is very difficult. If you want a solution to a problem, or a recommendation, or anything involving crowdsourcing, reddit is the knowledge base.
Then use it from Google, like a better Quora - but that doesn't mean you log in and contribute content or hang around.
I really need to stress that it’s so important that the subs on Reddit remain private until action is taken, I’m still not sure why the 2 day blackout was chosen in favour of an all out black out.
They probably weren't sure at the start of how much support they'd get so they decided to have a set date just so people could unite easier and would be more likely to take action. I'm sure they'd have suggested a longer period if they knew they'd get this much support. They probably also hoped Spez would've backed off by now.
The longer I go without Reddit, the more I realize I don't need it. Let it burn
Without Apollo, I don’t care what Reddit does.
RIF for me on Android. Reddit killed the mobile site (you can't open any NSFW posts there at all nowadays and it constantly buggers you to switch to the app). The official Reddit app is dogshit and you get all the ads on top.
So at least on mobile there's zero chance I'll keep using Reddit without RIF.
On the desktop I only use old.reddit.com and even that with RES. But I nuked my 11 year old account (overwrote all my comments and posts) and I don't really want to go back. The only subs I'm missing on here are things like /r/nvidia and /r/amd for tech news so far.
My two subs are both pretty small, but they're staying gone until/unless the API changes get reverted.
Fuck Spez.