Apollo will close down on June 30th • Hacker News Board

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#581

Post by lapcat » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:21 PM UTC

DecayingOrganic wrote: post #525

mustacheemperor wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is really astounding to see the CEO of Reddit being caught in a blatant lie denigrating a third party developer whose work has done a lot for the platform and who has the ear of a reasonably sized and loud portion of the community. I really hadn’t expected that. Corporate doublespeak is one thing, and management decisions aren’t necessarily always in the interest of their users - but such an egregious act is reall…

After carefully reading the comments and going back to the post, I take back my argument. It was flawed and did not represent the whole picture. I apologize for that. I think it wasn't a threat, but rather an unsuccessful attempt to sell Apollo before time runs out. I apologize for the confusion I created with my poor argument. I need to read more carefully. --- I initially clicked on this post fully prepared to be o…

> It is evident to me that this statement, "if you want Apollo to go quiet," did come across as a threat.

I just listened to your audio link several times, and I totally disagree that it sounded like a threat.

Also, the call was not with Steve, as Christian explained:

> Have you talked to CEO Steve Huffman about any of this?

> I requested a call to talk to Steve about some suggestions I had, his response was "Sorry, no. You can give name-redacted a ping if you want."

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#582

Post by shmatt » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:21 PM UTC

WestCoastJustin wrote: post #182

In this situation, do you hire someone to negotiate with or for you? I'm thinking the intention here was to sell the company for $10 million and that came across as a threat because of the language that was used. You would not record the call [1] and then publish it if you actually were blackmailing them for $10 million. I'm not faulting the guy here at all, I just think it comes down to lack of experience in dealing…

His app icon was showcased front and center at the WWDC keynote, something I always thought was bought with money, for (I assume) free. It has tons of users including paying users. I have a very hard time imagining being able to sell the app right now for less than 10 figures. All this fight has shown me is that people will gladly pay for this app monthly

If he's leaving all that on the table out of spite, well thats his money to lose. But he shouldn't call the world unfair

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#583

Post by LargeToes » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:22 PM UTC

hayst4ck wrote: post #561

LargeToes wrote: post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I love him. He is showing how labor needs to fight. There's a reason labor is losing power to owners and it's because they aren't having fights like Christian. Christian is showing how to give our children a future.

[flagged]

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#584

Post by bobsmooth » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:22 PM UTC

bardfinn wrote: post #414

robbiet480 wrote: post #14

I just don’t see Reddit’s response here other than “yes, turns out we are the bad guys who have been continually lying and manipulating the situation for our benefit”. I wonder if they’ll see employees quit over this. How do you trust your employer after this? I bet some subreddits will go permanently private or delete themselves over this. Just absolutely stunning turn of events, massive kudos to Christian for recor…

[flagged]

>Hi there, I am a so-called reddit "powermod"

Why?

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#585

Post by laserbeam » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:22 PM UTC

Demmme wrote: post #290

mustacheemperor wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is really astounding to see the CEO of Reddit being caught in a blatant lie denigrating a third party developer whose work has done a lot for the platform and who has the ear of a reasonably sized and loud portion of the community. I really hadn’t expected that. Corporate doublespeak is one thing, and management decisions aren’t necessarily always in the interest of their users - but such an egregious act is reall…

I actually believe reddit when they say the impact is small I'm using reddit for ages and never even considered anything besides their website. If the traffic to their site is primarily from the web (or web mobile or the official Reddit app), the client (3th party) users are only a loud minority. Of course I think the behavior is shitty but I don't think most people really care and reddit will not see any real impact…

So have I only used the official apps, and I believe most users are in the same bucket.

But. I'm not a mod. I don't know what mods use. And the only reason reddit is good is because communities have tools to moderate themselves.

What I use is kind of irrelevant if the people who keep the communities I visit consistent and relatively clean are pissed and walk out. A casual user won't drop the site when Apolo closes, it would be slightly later when reddit becomes 4chan in absence of moderation.

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#586

Post by stagger87 » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:23 PM UTC

mandevil wrote: post #564

stagger87 wrote: post #498

Maybe I missed it, but why not just increase Apollo subscription rates to match the new pricing? It sounds like Apollo has a huge following that would be willing to support it. Take advantage of the hate train, tons of people would donate through a subscription model. It also sounds like these third party apps provide much better moderation interfaces, that could a selling point for the rates. Even if your subscripti…

He says, in the FA, that the problem was that Reddit's prices kick in 1 month from now, but plenty of people have already pre-paid him for a year at the old price. So he loses 50k the first month, then 10% of his user base re-ups at the new price and month 2 he only loses 45k, then another 10% renew and he only loses 40k in month 3... not really a sustainable way to run a business.

Yea, I read that. I think that's a negative outlook. How many of those customers are sympathetic and would re-up at a new subscription rate? How many sympathetic new subscriptions could be generated? Refund current outstanding subs, and start a new sub, never take a hit. I mean, don't get me wrong, they can do whatever they want, it just doesn't seem like the dead end they make it.

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#587

Post by Rebelgecko » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:23 PM UTC

bardfinn wrote: post #500

mustacheemperor wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is really astounding to see the CEO of Reddit being caught in a blatant lie denigrating a third party developer whose work has done a lot for the platform and who has the ear of a reasonably sized and loud portion of the community. I really hadn’t expected that. Corporate doublespeak is one thing, and management decisions aren’t necessarily always in the interest of their users - but such an egregious act is reall…

[flagged]

There have been subreddit going dark for 2-3 days en masse in the past. IIRC they usually accomplished their stated goal.

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#588

Post by replwoacause » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:24 PM UTC

Exuma wrote: post #233

What did everyone think of that call? I'm not a client-facing person (a developer) so I might have been tongue in cheek myself as well. Not sure how any of that sounded threatening though...

Christian came off somewhat flippantly and didn’t sound particularly experienced, but overall I trust his account of things. The reddit CEO seems like a weirdo to me.

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#589

Post by Firmwarrior » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:24 PM UTC

minimaxir wrote: post #139

willidiots wrote: post #96

I hope Apollo's not overplaying their hand here, though it's super interesting hearing these conversations from the inside. It's clear reddit's got it out for the 3p apps, and I'm personally leaving reddit over this (longtime RIF user), but this post is a bit concerning. It focuses on the "[apollo can] quiet down [for $10M]" topic in the conversation, and the apparent misunderstanding between Apollo and Reddit, Reddi…

The point of the post is that Apollo has no more leverage after exhausting all other moves.

Apollo needs to launch its own backend IMO. Reddit itself isn't some technological marvel.

Re: Apollo will close down on June 30th

#590

Post by brokencode » Thu, Jun 08, 2023, 8:24 PM UTC

I never thought Reddit would be so aggressive with their community after how poorly things went for Twitter.

Why not roll out these changes slower and ramp up fees over time? Why not give app developers time to adapt?

Apollo is written by one guy. Is it really fair to tell him to rewrite his business model and make significant changes to his app in just a month or two?