Reddit Boss Doubles Down on Pricing Changes Amid Blackout

Days after much of Reddit decided to undergo a self-imposed blackout protesting some changes the site has made, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman has doubled down on the changes that started the online protests in the first place. In a memo sent to employees at the company, Huffman compared the blackout to “noise,” telling employees it’d pass before too long at all.

“Starting last night, about a thousand subreddits have gone private. We do anticipate many of them will come back by Wednesday, as many have said as much. While we knew this was coming, it is a challenge nevertheless and we have our work cut out for us,” Huffman said in the memo. “A number of Snoos have been working around the clock, adapting to infrastructure strains, engaging with communities, and responding to the myriad of issues related to this blackout. Thank you, team.”

According to the executive, Reddit has not suffered “any significant” revenue impact as a part of the blackout before confirming the protests aren’t forcing any changes at the site.

“Please know that our teams are on it, and like all blowups on Reddit, this one will pass as well. The most important things we can do right now are stay focused, adapt to challenges, and keep moving forward,” he added. “We absolutely must ship what we said we would. The only long term solution is improving our product, and in the short term we have a few upcoming critical mod tool launches we need to nail.”

Huffman ended his email warning employees not to wear Reddit merchandise or apparel in public to further flame the protests.

Why did Reddit shut down?

Earlier this year, Reddit announced sizable pricing increases for its API system. Used by many third-party applications and websites, pricing to connect to the API system went from a couple of dollars for millions of API calls to a staggering $12,000 for the same amount. In protest, many of the site’s subreddits opted to take themselves offline in hopes of getting the site to reverse the decision.

Huffman’s full memo to employees can be found below.

Hi Snoos,

Starting last night, about a thousand subreddits have gone private. We do anticipate many of them will come back by Wednesday, as many have said as much. While we knew this was coming, it is a challenge nevertheless and we have our work cut out for us. A number of Snoos have been working around the clock, adapting to infrastructure strains, engaging with communities, and responding to the myriad of issues related to this blackout. Thank you, team.

We have not seen any significant revenue impact so far and we will continue to monitor.

There’s a lot of noise with this one. Among the noisiest we’ve seen. Please know that our teams are on it, and like all blowups on Reddit, this one will pass as well. The most important things we can do right now are stay focused, adapt to challenges, and keep moving forward. We absolutely must ship what we said we would. The only long term solution is improving our product, and in the short term we have a few upcoming critical mod tool launches we need to nail.

While the two biggest third-party apps, Apollo and RIF, along with a couple others, have said they plan to shut down at the end of the month, we are still in conversation with some of the others. And as I mentioned in my post last week, we will exempt accessibility-focused apps and so far have agreements with RedReader and Dystopia.

I am sorry to say this, but please be mindful of wearing Reddit gear in public. Some folks are really upset, and we don’t want you to be the object of their frustrations.

Again, we’ll get through it. Thank you to all of you for helping us do so.