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Sync will shut down on June 30

reddit.com

31–40 of 129 posts

Re: Sync will shut down on June 30

#31
post #23

Rather than shut down, it would be a great time for all these clients to get together and decide on an official alternative site to reddit, and start supporting that. If they did it en-masse and in a coordinated fashion, it might be enough social momentum to achieve escape velocity on the new site.

What’s out there? I genuinely don’t know of any that would fit the Reddit data model.

Yeah I don't know either. How hard could it be to build though? I say that half-jokingly...

Is the reddit API complex?

Re: Sync will shut down on June 30

#32
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t wait for Reddit to crash and burn because of this. And no, I don’t feel bad for the workers because they can (and still have time to) unionize and stop the madness.

Ran into a user who shared a screenshot of the mobile app (for unrelated reasons to the topic at hand). They admitted the mobile app 'sucked' yet didn't care. Apathy is real, and most users have it. Reddit will be fine.

Power users are the most affected here, and power users bring the most value to Reddit.

Mods specifically have always been Reddit’s golden goose. Free content moderation by volunteers is Reddit’s only advantage over other social media platforms. FB pays absurd numbers of humans to do what power users do for Reddit for free.

When the mods fall, the quality falls.

Re: Sync will shut down on June 30

#33
post #23

Rather than shut down, it would be a great time for all these clients to get together and decide on an official alternative site to reddit, and start supporting that. If they did it en-masse and in a coordinated fashion, it might be enough social momentum to achieve escape velocity on the new site.

Reddit already purchased one of these apps and 'improved' upon it over the years. I don't see why they would feel the need to purchase another app.

I meant go the other way -- the apps band together and all decide to support some alternative backend, instead of the official reddit. Ultimately it's the users that make a site valuable, and the clients seem to have a lot more goodwill than reddit itself right now.

Of course, "just add a backend" is easier said than done!

But not unachievable.

Re: Sync will shut down on June 30

#35
post #23

Rather than shut down, it would be a great time for all these clients to get together and decide on an official alternative site to reddit, and start supporting that. If they did it en-masse and in a coordinated fashion, it might be enough social momentum to achieve escape velocity on the new site.

Building an alternative to Reddit is actually incredibly hard, especially if you suddenly get a huge influx of new users. Not talking about the technical side of things, but the community. How should the developers of these clients feel certain that whatever alternative they decide to endorse won't end up like Voat?

Re: Sync will shut down on June 30

#36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree & I'm glad we've come to a resolution

username does not match

It's irrelevant to the topic, but I actively dislike Reddit and would be happy for it to die. I use old school forums more than anything else online. Reddit killed those.

Re: Sync will shut down on June 30

#37
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s out there? I genuinely don’t know of any that would fit the Reddit data model.

Yeah I don't know either. How hard could it be to build though? I say that half-jokingly... Is the reddit API complex?

I doubt the API would be complicated, the issue will be in all of the little QoL/scaling features: moderator settings, automoderation bots, hosting photos and videos in a scalable way. I imagine behind the scenes bot/spam detection is an entire engineering team.

Re: Sync will shut down on June 30

#38
post #23

Rather than shut down, it would be a great time for all these clients to get together and decide on an official alternative site to reddit, and start supporting that. If they did it en-masse and in a coordinated fashion, it might be enough social momentum to achieve escape velocity on the new site.

What’s out there? I genuinely don’t know of any that would fit the Reddit data model.

There's Lemmy, not perfect but it is designed to be Reddit-ish.

Re: Sync will shut down on June 30

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is Sync a business?

There's only a paid version or an ad-supported version, so yes.

I love my 3rd party Reddit app, but when their business model is either 1) don’t show Reddit’s ads and instead show their own ads, or 2) charge a fee to remove all ads (including Reddit’s) - it does feel like it was just a matter of time before this happened.

Reddit should have said Reddit premium users can use 3rd party clients / unlimited API calls. Messaging something like: If you want no-ads you have to pay Reddit (not someone else), but if you feel their client is better feel free to use it. The landscape for 3rd party clients would probably still dry up (who wants to pay 2x subscription fees), but it would have been better PR.

Re: Sync will shut down on June 30

#40
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t wait for Reddit to crash and burn because of this. And no, I don’t feel bad for the workers because they can (and still have time to) unionize and stop the madness.

Unions don't make business decisions.

Unions can definitely influence them. E.g., that's a big part of the point of the German Betriebsrat: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Works_council#Germany
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