this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2023
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Technology

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (5 children)

The ama convinced me they kill old.Reddit as soon as they get the sense that this has ‘blown over.’ By October for sure.

spoiler


[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

this is what im expecting too, which is why im trying the migration thing rather than just sticking to desktop/browser-only. might as well stay ahead of them

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Personally, after reading about how they've behaved with the apollo dev, I've decided to move away from them anyway. I'll miss the communities but hopefully I can find a home here

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

agreed actually, ive been feeling progressively less comfortable using reddit for a long while now & all this just reinforces it.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Between the reposts and vitriolic comments growing in number I was already feeling like it was time to figure something else out. u/spez lying throughout the ama just made it a very easy decision to start making the switch now.

Lemmy having small communities and less bs is just wonderful I don’t think I’m going back

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I know this is blasphemy and I've always understood how shit the app is, but I don't even use third party apps (I tried them before, never felt fully comfortable with any of them idk) and use the official app. So this wouldn't even totally affect me but I can see how bad this change is and why many people use third party apps because of said app's shitness and didn't even consider blind/low vision accessibility before now but obviously that's a major issue, before the accessibility exception they literally wouldn't be able to use the site on their phone at all, the mobile website is actually unusable its spammed with 2-3 notifications per page telling you to get the app, and they killed compact reddit which could be used with a screenreader. Also I can see despite spez saying he's keeping old reddit and nsfw, he's a proven liar and manipulator.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

I guess it's a good thing that reddit's nag to install their android app instead of allowing the browser was so annoying that I've never used reddit on my phone. I've already wasted enough time scrolling recycled memes and karma famers, frankly.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Same. I'll probably still use reddit on desktop to use some of the communities I like that aren't in lemmy yet, but I'm gonna use lemmy only on mobile.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

Yeah, I don't see any reason for spez to put it in the OP unless it's on the chopping block too.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

even though he said old.reddit will stay around, and him lying on everything today in the AMA i wouldn’t be surprised if it got taken down soon after the API change goes into effect

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's funny how he phrased it: "old.reddit.com isn't going anywhere, and explicit content is still allowed.

Phrased it like it could change in the near future.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

They sad in January that there won't be any significant changes to the api, so I feel like their words became meaningless.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The main 2 changes they want to make before the IPO are killing old reddit (no/less data siphoning, css, no stupid nfts/animations/other dumb attempts at monetization) and removing anything nsfw (not just porn, anything considered nsfw like gore, violence, etc. This means state/police violence gets removed, anything to do with war gets removed.)

idk how much impact banning third party apps will have, but if/when they get rid of old reddit, that will be much worse for them. right now at least there's that as the last bastion of classic reddit pre-enshittification. Many subreddits will just outright stop working as they rely on classic css for critical features (as well as bots, the api will eventually be rendered unusable for them as well probably). Also, moderation is hard/impossible on new reddit or the official app. At that point, discussions about moving the subreddit to a custom css lemmy instance start happening.

then goes porn subreddits. Tbh, those users and that content is actually a net negative on the business in general i'm guessing (no ads served, google/apple/mastercard/visa breathing down their necks). That's still a hell of a lot of users lost permanently, which is X less on the active user count to show to investors.

I'm just wondering, by the time they get to their IPO, all of these changes will have turned away basically all veteran reddit users and moderators. I don't think they're going to put up with rebellious moderators, they'll just replace them (there's already going to be a list of "reddit approved moderators" that can use mod bots, this is the start of that). Will there even be anything left by IPO time? Will there even be an IPO, if the users go down by 40% like tumblr? I mean, they could easily just pivot to a mainstream facebook/instagram/tiktok alternative, but will it work? Those apps already exist. Why would anyone ever go from them to reddit? They'd have to be filling a market gap, like tiktok did after vine got shut down. I just don't see it happening.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I thought that the nsfw content was going to be still available, just not exposed in the API. They know that porn sells so I think that the idea is: you wanna see NSFW? You gotta go through the official app so we can get that sweet money of ads/user usage/user engagement, thing that if they allowed the NSFW content through the API they will lose

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

It'll still be available, but for how long? The way it was worded was similar to the way old.reddit would still be around....

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Yep. I think this is pretty much guaranteed at this point. Can't have anything users actually want to keep around, that might hurt profits.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 year ago (4 children)

I would love it if Christian would make a Lemmy client. The idea and technology powering Lemmy is great, but it desperately needs a client with a user centered design.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

Jerboa ftw! Currently using it, completely deleted my reddit account and uninstalled Infinity. I was already considering doing it before this whole situation appeared, but the double down by spez was the last straw for me

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I use it on Android via FDroid, where you have to install Fdroid via APK download from their website. You will have to allow installing apps from your browser. Then, after installing FDroid, you'll need to find jerboa there and install it (and allow installing apps from FDroid again as well). And Google's dumbass play protect will also complain, so you'll have to disable that, too.

Not sure if Jerboa is on the playstore? It's on git here.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

I got Jerboa from the Play store so it's there now. Overall it's not bad, I like the UI but there seem to be a few bugs to work out. For example, I've noticed that if there are images in comments, the scroll starts stuttering, the screen flickers, and it's difficult to scroll past the image. Not a deal breaker but hopefully Lemmy will get popular enough to attract more devs. I think Jerboa is a good start though, I hope to see it improve.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Ahh. I'm in iOS land. I've been trying the TestFlight builds of Mlem, which are promising, but still very much feel like a work in progress.

Also, IMHO, the Mlem developer should really submit to the AppStore. Keeping things in TestFlight isn't going to be great for onboarding iOS folks who aren't like me, in software development for a living.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago

The devs were not ready for a sudden influx of users. But with influx users some more devs have joined the contribution too, so hopefully improvements will come frequently.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

I'm hopeful i'm enjoying kbin thus far but this its a bit confusing lol a simplified mobile design would be awesome

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago

Hardly surprising. Any popular app is going to have enough users that it doesn’t make economic sense to stay. A niche app that’s halfway decent will soon have enough users they’ll need to fold to.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I was a RIF user for as long as it's been around, and have had a Reddit account for 12+ years now. It's unfortunate to have to walk away, but I honestly had been hating it there for a while.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Definitely. I work from home, so I use old.reddit most of the time, but any time I'm away from my machine, I'll use RIF. Wouldn't touch their app with a 10 foot pole, and in a mobile browser it isn't great either. Behind the scenes the whole place is crumbling.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

ljdawson wrote that she's looking into "Sync for Lemmy" a couple hours ago. Sync's my favorite Reddit client (best tablet support on Android IMHO), so that would be great.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

That would be awesome!

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Does anyone know if Infinity for Reddit is shutting down too?

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (4 children)

It's fairly safe to assume that all third party reddit apps will be shutting down. The price they've been quoted for API access is simply too high, and I don't think any of the devs are rich enough to keep it running out of their own pockets. I wouldn't be surprised to see some apps try to stay up, but I highly doubt they can last long term.

Either that or they'd have to start charging each user tons of money, and/or disabling free users entirely.

In the recent AMA it was said that apps that focus on accessibility might get free access, but based on what devs are saying about having trouble getting in touch with anyone at reddit, I wouldn't get your hopes up.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

RedReader has posted that they have officially received an exclusion from the API fees due to their extensive accessibility features for those who are blind or visually impaired. So if anyone wants to use reddit without the official app, that app will stay up past June 30th. I have a feeling that Reddit will focus some development on accessibility, and if a lot of people switch over to RedReader to avoid the ads and bullshit in the official app, Reddit will kill it. It's only a matter of time at this point.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Has anyone heard anything about Boost?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

I don't think the developer has posted his plans yet, but I wouldn't be shocked if he also decides to kill it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah that makes sense. I guess I'm just a little surprised that I haven't seen any official announcement from Infinity yet.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Hostilenemy (dev of Infinity) has said the following things:

"Hey thanks everyone. I guess our best bet is to allow custom API key in the app. Ridiculous price!!!!" Source

"This will not be the end. But users may need to get their API keys themselves." Source

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I know RedReader is one of the apps that's being allowed as an accessibility tool. But, even then they'll still be cut off from NSFW content if I understand right. This means you get access to some of Reddit but, obviously not all of it, which is just BS for anyone who wants to keep using it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I've been using Sync for Reddit with my own API key patched into it (there's some guides on how to do it for most of the popular apps!) and NSFW content still shows for me, including NSFW subs. I read that they were supposed to be stopping that on July 5th and it's currently the 6th. Still can happen, but perhaps there's a chance they're not stopping NSFW for personal API use?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

RIP Reddplanet and Narwhal. For many people Apollo was their main, but for me I stuck by those two until the bitter end.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago
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