r/redditisfun • u/talklittle RIF Dev • May 31 '23

RIF dev here - Reddit's API changes will likely kill RIF and other apps, on July 1, 2023

I need more time to get all my thoughts together, but posting this quick post since so many users have been asking, and it's been making rounds on news sites.

Summary of what Reddit Inc has announced so far, specifically the parts that will kill many third-party apps:

  1. The Reddit API will cost money, and the pricing announced today will cost apps like Apollo $20 million per year to run. RIF may differ but it would be in the same ballpark. And no, RIF does not earn anywhere remotely near this number.

  2. As part of this they are blocking ads in third-party apps, which make up the majority of RIF's revenue. So they want to force a paid subscription model onto RIF's users. Meanwhile Reddit's official app still continues to make the vast majority of its money from ads.

  3. Removal of sexually explicit material from third-party apps while keeping said content in the official app. Some people have speculated that NSFW is going to leave Reddit entirely, but then why would Reddit Inc have recently expanded NSFW upload support on their desktop site?

Their recent moves smell a lot like they want third-party apps gone, RIF included.

I know some users will chime in saying they are willing to pay a monthly subscription to keep RIF going, but trust me that you would be in the minority. There is very little value in paying a high subscription for less content (in this case, NSFW). Honestly if I were a user of RIF and not the dev, I'd have a hard time justifying paying the high prices being forced by Reddit Inc, despite how much RIF obviously means to me.

There is a lot more I want to say, and I kind of scrambled to write this since I didn't expect news reports today. I'll probably write more follow-up posts that are better thought out. But this is the gist of what's been going on with Reddit third-party apps in 2023.

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1.3k

u/NumerousAbility May 31 '23 edited Jun 01 '23

RiF is the app I stuck with when I started using Reddit. I've tried many other apps and always found myself coming back to it. It's the first app I ever bought.

To me RiF is Reddit.

I guess this might be how I finally cure my Reddit addiction.

I hope this decision gets reversed, but if it isn't Thank you for this app.

273

u/Jose_Canseco_Jr May 31 '23

I guess this might be how I finally cure my Reddit addiction.

same.. must suck to work for reddit right now, and realize that many (most?) of your long term users welcome the opportunity to avoid the site forever

99

u/Smallzfry Jun 01 '23

They don't care about long-term users. All of the changes they've made recently have been to pull in new users from other sites. That's why there's avatars and actual profile pages you can follow individually now. There's that weird livestream feature on r/pan and the new interface sends updates when you get upvotes on comments. None of this appeals to old users because they don't care about any of us.

53

u/Jimbob0i0 Jun 01 '23

Feels very much like the Digg disaster that caused many of us, myself included, to migrate from that site to here.

29

u/[deleted] Jun 01 '23

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Jun 01 '23

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Nosedivelever Jun 01 '23

Yes. I usually work the night shift. I'll probably spend the next 10 years memorizing Wikipedia.

7

u/stick-insect-enema Jun 01 '23

Fark still exists

1

u/yunivor Jun 02 '23

What is Fark? Never heard of it before

5

u/iller_mitch Jun 01 '23

Are you familiar with....TVtropes?

4

u/Nosedivelever Jun 01 '23

Oh yeah. VastAndDreaming is right. You monster.

3

u/yunivor Jun 02 '23

There's also the SCP foundation

1

u/Prazival Jun 08 '23

I ve been doing this before I knew Reddit and even now still read a lot of Wikipedia for fun.

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u/EnglishMobster Jun 03 '23 edited Jun 03 '23

Someone mentioned Tildes - Tildes is great if you want like 2009-era Reddit. Tildes focuses on discussion and conversations, not memes or "fluff". (This may change if Reddit starts migrating over en masse... but I doubt it. It's pretty core to their identity.)

For "mindless scrolling", there's Lemmy. People get scared off by the Fediverse and "join a server" - but really you don't need to think about it. The main difference between servers is how they're moderated and what appears in your instance's version of /r/all. But it's got memes and is closer to today's Reddit.

Beehaw.org is the closest culturally to Reddit. You can see what instances appear in their "all" tab here, and what instances are blocked. You can see what actions their mods have taken here.

lemmy.ml is the instance run by Lemmy's dev team and used to be the "default" instance. It has a looser style and allows more flexibility in what's posted, but it federates with a lot more instances. Lemmy.ml also allows anyone to make communities (subreddits), whereas Beehaw takes the old-fashioned approach of admins making each subreddit.

No matter what you join, you can subscribe to any "community" (subreddit) on any instance. They'll all come together to make your frontpage, just like Reddit.

Both Beehaw and Lemmy.ml have been slammed recently, and it's been extremely active. You can use the Android app Jerboa to navigate it on mobile; I think you'll find a very familiar-feeling interface. ;)

1

u/focus_rising Jun 01 '23

Try out tildes, it's a bit like oldschool Reddit: /r/tildes for an invite

2

u/mofugginrob Jun 03 '23

Invites? Doomed from the start.

1

u/focus_rising Jun 03 '23

I think the idea is to help cut down on the amount of problematic troll users. With reddit, you can just spin up throwaway after throwaway, so there's very little incentive to behave or put any effort behind your account/participation.

1

u/mofugginrob Jun 03 '23

Hmm. Yeah, I'm dumb.

1

u/focus_rising Jun 03 '23

To be fair, it's a long way from being a reddit replacement, but it is an interesting alternative for people who want out. Their servers went down today because of the influx of new users, so it'll be interesting to see how things go over the coming month.

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u/davidverner Jun 02 '23

While the .win network has its issues. It might be the better option if the changes keep on going in the direction as they are.

1

u/seizuregirlz Jun 03 '23

Any ideas? Reddit through RIF I used while recovering in the hospital for months. It's so much easier and better to use. I have the regular reddit app and I've noticed lately they have made changes to make the pages look more like rif. I still prefer rif and when something opens up in the reddit app I copy-paste it into rif. Idk if I'll keep redditng now.

1

u/THED4NIEL Jun 04 '23

https://join-lemmy.org/

Reddit-like alternative in the fediverse someone on /r/de presented recently: https://feddit.de/

Had to think about this thread, so thought I might share it

25

u/Hotel_Joy Jun 01 '23
  1. Move to Reddit
  2. Move to 3rd party app
  3. Move to real life and better ways to spend our time <-- we are now here

5

u/zerd Jun 02 '23 
4. Find another time sink

2

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '23

But...but... I don't WANNA real life. It's depressing as fuck out here.... I want to continue to mindlessly scroll while looking at cute animal pics and gifs and reading about interesting shit and enjoying the comment threads they generate.

Fucking reddit. I feel like we should have all seen this coming but wishful thinking led to my continuing to scroll RIF.

1

u/IcyInga Jun 02 '23

Upvote, but/and I love Reddit

1

u/Dummdummgumgum Jun 03 '23

Unfortunately I not only use reddit for pleasure. The archives are for actual problems I face and need a helpful solution for. Its a safe haven for many minorities that need to talk about their issues. ( which is impossible if everything is an add on the original app).

Ontop of that reddit has many amazing subs that enhance reallife experience ( sports and exercise subs, science subs and cooking/DIY stuff and guides).

1

u/theycallmeMrPotter Jun 04 '23

But I don't like it.

14

u/8_Foot_Vertical_Leap Jun 01 '23

Between this and the twitter fiasco, I'm taking it as a sign that the doomscroll days are over for me, and that's a good thing.

9

u/iller_mitch Jun 01 '23

I'll have to find the new hot memes the old fashioned way: Grandma emails.

7

u/[deleted] Jun 01 '23

[deleted]

2

u/BubbaWhoaTep Jun 01 '23

I switched over to Lemmy when reddit killed Chapo.

3

u/randomaccessmustache Jun 01 '23

Was wondering where the new traphouse was

3

u/tryplot Jun 01 '23

I'm actually thinking of dusting off my Tumblr account

3

u/redditforgotaboutme Jun 01 '23

Facebook!!! J/k. Also an oldschool Digg user here. This post sucked to read. Ugh.

2

u/Funktastic34 Jun 01 '23 edited Jul 07 '23

This comment has been edited to protest Reddit's decision to shut down all third party apps. Spez had negotiated in bad faith with 3rd party developers and made provenly false accusations against them. Reddit IS it's users and their post/comments/moderation. It is clear they have no regard for us users, only their advertisers. I hope enough users join in this form of protest which effects Reddit's SEO and they will be forced to take the actual people that make this website into consideration. We'll see how long this comment remains as spez has in the past, retroactively edited other users comments that painted him in a bad light. See you all on the "next reddit" after they finish running this one into the ground in the never ending search of profits. -- mass edited with redact.dev

3

u/stick-insect-enema Jun 01 '23

That's because FOX had him stuffed and mounted that way in 2005 when they bought Myspace. It was the only way Rupert could get a hug.

1

u/MushroomSaute Jun 01 '23

Not even j/k, when I inevitably stop using Reddit it will be the site I use most, because I can at least join groups to do IRL activities with.

3

u/disquiet Jun 02 '23

I've found Twitter increasingly replacing reddit for me. It's not quite the same but honestly the lack of moderation is a huge plus. Way too many subreddits completely ruined by overzealous mods.

2

u/18-24-61-B-17-17-4 Jun 01 '23

Wondering the same thing myself.

2

u/SunshineCat Jun 01 '23

I've started to post on the old forum i used in the early 2000s. It's still there, and i can login to my old account.

2

u/stufff Jun 01 '23

Lets bring Geocities back and start a WebRing.

1

u/I_Don-t_Care Jun 01 '23

Last time this happen everyone migrated to voat, but it was eventually shut down for being too ungoverned

2

u/firebreathingbunny Jun 02 '23

Let's not spread misinformation. It was shut down by the site admin himself, and he never disclosed why he did it.

2

u/I_Don-t_Care Jun 02 '23

Yes I stand corrected, I didn't quite recall the true reason, just recalled that it was due to being a very controversial platform.

2

u/firebreathingbunny Jun 02 '23

That may or may not have been a factor. We just don't know.

1

u/firebreathingbunny Jun 02 '23

The closest thing to a politically neutral workalike is scored.co.

1

u/Ranik_Sandaris Jun 02 '23

pornhub comment section?

1

u/throwawaywitchaccoun Jun 03 '23

Tell me if you figure it out

1

u/Devils_Demon Jun 04 '23

Try Neoseeker. I migrated from Neoseeker to Reddit purely because Reddit was obviously a lot more active. Guess it's time to move back home.

1

u/theycallmeMrPotter Jun 04 '23

Sounds like a huge opportunity for the right team.

1

u/basementdweller999 Jun 05 '23

Unironically? Tumblr. They unbanned porn and everything.

2

u/zipdiss Jun 01 '23

Yeah, this is going to be very bad for Reddit.

It seems like this is a money grab to make up for a drop in daily active users. Which peaked at 52 million in 2020-2021 and dropped to 50 in 2020.

This will only accelerate that and probably lead to more stupid decisions.

It's really sad.

1

u/BeholdTheHair Jun 01 '23

It seems like this is a money grab to make up for a drop in daily active users. Which peaked at 52 million in 2020-2021 and dropped to 50 in 2020.

So yet another company failing to understand coof numbers were a thoroughly temporary inflation based on aberrant market conditions and were fundamentally unsustainable.

2

u/MakeRIFworkagain Jun 01 '23

I'm a digg refugee too

2

u/ThorDogAtlas Jun 02 '23

Oh my gosh, you nailed exactly what I was thinking.

Digg... What a trip down memory lane. Wow did that ever crash and burn.

Reddit's interface was something I used to like, but as it turned more cheesy and commercialized I found RiF. 🤮 Those stupid AMAs 🙄

I'm a premium user, or subscriber, whatever it's called. RiF is worth every penny because it makes something I enjoyed enjoyable, and it's a GREAT app.

I refuse to install the Reddit app again. I tried it, it's rage inducing. I hate, hate hate seeing ads during the limited free time I have. That and the interface sucks.

If it's the official reddit app or nothing then I'll be finding any work around there is or jumping ship 😡 maybe this will be the push to content to real journalists that real journalism needs

1

u/storelogix Jun 01 '23

Exactly this.

1

u/Real_Kevin_Smith Jun 01 '23

Just got to talk.lol

Or Poal

1

u/thewiglaf Jun 01 '23

Are you stupid? Why would you come on here and seriously suggest a website (talk.lol) that has these as the current top 10 posts?

  1. Post about Jews trying to control some narrative about an Easter celebration in Spain
  2. Joke about Jews being stingy with money
  3. Unironic post about "negro fatigue" because of "ni--ers" moving into a gated community and not parking their car properly
  4. Implication of Biden corruption conspiracy theory
  5. A sort of work reform kinda post that you would see on reddit
  6. Joke about "ni--er k-kes"
  7. Meme about CIA conspiracy theory
  8. Anti-immigration post about how Australia is allowing "curry-munchers" to move in despite rising rents
  9. A meme I don't understand involving Pepe the frog, Nazis, and Jews
  10. Fear mongering video about cars being banned in cities

Scroll down the rest of the page and it's more "ni--ers", "Jews", and conspiracy theories. You cannot be serious posting that here. Are you stupid, or just a troll?

1

u/firebreathingbunny Jun 02 '23

Try posting the same stuff here and see how long it lasts.

1

u/limejuiceroyale Jun 01 '23

Damn, that's how I ended up here too. And you reminded me I'm old enough to remember when digg was good.

1

u/Niku-Man Jun 01 '23

Well what will be the new reddit then?

1

u/Jealentuss Jun 01 '23

Maybe this is the genesis of something new and better

1

u/Phobos95 Jun 02 '23

Man, talk about ancient history. I barely even remember Digg.

1

u/bigd5783 Jun 03 '23

I was thinking EXACTLY the same thing. I guess history always repeats itself. You either die a hero or live to see yourself become the villain.

1

u/SomeoneInQld Jun 03 '23

I can remember going through the Digg drama at the time and agree this feels like the same thing happening all over again.

​

Once again - history will repeat.

1

u/Senuf Jun 04 '23 edited Jun 30 '23

Deleted June 30th. 2023. Yay.

1

u/appleparkfive Jun 04 '23

If someone makes a competitor site that enforces no harassment and no hate speech, it has a very good chance at surpassing Reddit (if they go through with this decision). The competitors always have some crazy horrible people end up on them. But if there's a site that welcomes the same casual Reddit user, it could be a huge boon for them

1

u/aiccount Jun 06 '23

So where to next? Any idea of good reddit alternatives?

9

u/911ChickenMan Jun 01 '23

Reddit is becoming Facebook

11

u/5213 Jun 01 '23

Social media in general is becoming homogenized

When one app does well with something, the others jump on it like crazy. It's why Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube all have a "story" function like Snapchat; and why Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube have "reels" or "shorts" like TikTok. And it's why Reddit is adopting all those things.

3

u/[deleted] Jun 01 '23

I wish they'd understand that nobody wants Reddit to be Facebook or Tiktok.

4

u/5213 Jun 01 '23

The problem is that people do want that, though. Or they just don't care enough to not want it. That's why those features get used constantly. My spouse scrolls fb's videos, my ten year old almost exclusively watches YouTube shorts when he's on his phone and only watches longer videos on the TV, and my brother watches Instagram reels. Even tiktok forces you to watch the daily posts made by the accounts you follow, since they just show up in your feed like regular posts.

We don't have to like it, but if those features didn't add anything (read: users, which leads to engagement, which leads to more money for the execs), then those features would die off. We're drops in a bucket compared to the oceans of people that use all those features.

8

u/[deleted] Jun 01 '23

[deleted]

1

u/5213 Jun 01 '23

this isn't about appealing to users. this is about monetizing them.

Yes, but at some level you need to appeal to the user so you can bring in more and monetize their usage of the app. And these days, it's seemingly all about new users, not existing ones. It's why more and more products, goods, and services are moving towards a subscription based model. Except execs are, again, fucking stupid, so they seemingly only see the new user/subscriber number as the important one, not the retained number (until that retained number becomes an unsubscribed/left number, like with the several Pokémon Go issues this year).

1

u/Great_Zarquon Jun 01 '23

That's an excellent article thanks, ironic that it came through wired though lol

1

u/Siegfried_Chicken Jun 01 '23

Excellent read! Thanks for posting.

3

u/wright007 Jun 01 '23

It's kinda like junk food vs health food, and we're all being forced away from the health food and onto the addictive junk food diet that makes them more money.

2

u/ExpeditionTransition Jun 01 '23

All those features are also crafted to be as addictive as possible. It's not at all about providing value to people, it's about manipulating humans so they spend more time on your product creating value for the shareholder.

It's obviously hard for us to evaluate the worth of these changes for us, the users, but taken piecemeal it sure feels like these companies have lost the plot in supporting the intention of their products that got them popular in the first place.

2

u/Start_button Jun 01 '23

Doesn't matter what we want, only matters what will make the overlords more money.

Gotta keep them admins happy...

1

u/Makethemneverbloom Jun 12 '23

well at least without the internet you can face a book and be able to read from it unlike this greedit api change cash grab.......

6

u/smallfried Jun 01 '23

Yup, old time users are not inclined to start paying for something that was always free. I think I've spent a total of 5 euros for the 14 years I've been here.

My only value to reddit might be some hopefully helpful comments, but i negate those with some passionate ranting from time to time.

2

u/JanitorMaster Jun 01 '23

In the Attention Economy™, passionate rants are worth a lot more than helpful comments :/

2

u/Mortomes Jun 01 '23

the new interface sends updates when you get upvotes on comments.

That is obnoxious as hell

2

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '23

Yep...because let's make reddit just another irritating social media site to add friends to... ugh

I won't be using the official app at all so I guess when this all takes effect on my birthday, it will be time to say goodbye to reddit

1

u/Pooptimist Jun 01 '23

Then let's start a new reddit-like site!

1

u/FatchRacall Jun 01 '23

With blackjack!

1

u/Gravesh Jun 01 '23

I don't know how to use any of those features, and I don't care to use them in the slightest.

1

u/CatManDontDo Jun 01 '23

Notifications on upvotes? Gross

1

u/dwntwnleroybrwn Jun 01 '23

The new users are totally different too. A few weeks ago I was told to go to 4chan if I didn't like the "new reddit". It's littlerally turned into Facebook.

1

u/EggCouncilCreeps Jun 01 '23

There's profile pages?

1

u/Smallzfry Jun 01 '23

Kind of, yes. Click on someone's username on old.reddit and compare it to the same page on new reddit. Some people have custom avatars, links to other sites on the side, and pinned posts, plus you can follow them directly. It's not the same as other sites, but still very different than what I'm used to.

1

u/EggCouncilCreeps Jun 01 '23

New reddit? oh fuck that.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '23

This change is to kill third party apps so that people are forced to use reddits official app and see what the ads on it.

1

u/ZenHun Jun 03 '23

yeah it's so awesome, now I can get followed by 300 sex bots a day. Great...

1

u/44problems Jun 05 '23

Long term users do mod the communities, and for free. An unmodded Reddit will quickly decay, and maybe the company wants that, just have a few subs left for memes and cute animals.