As we reported last week, Reddit plans to make some changes under the hood that will essentially shut down every third-party app readers use to engage with the site’s communities. Given the state of the official app and its heavy reliance on huge ads, this is one deep unpopular move, so unpopular that it has sparked a protest movement that’s encompassing more and more major subreddits by the day.
As the days passed after the original announcement, a gathering of unpaid Reddit moderators ensued got together and wrote an open letter to the site managementIt’s not just about the overall popularity of the third-party apps, but also concerns about the possible loss of key moderation tools (which many third-party apps have but somehow lack official offering) and the impact on NSFW content.
This letter was bolstered by plans for much of the site to “blackout” on June 12, meaning individual subreddits will be locked into “private” mode, meaning anyone who isn’t already a follower/ Subscriber, you will not be able to access them or see their content.
Next to big subreddits like r/bestof, r/sports, r/music, r/pics, and r/videos, a number of the most popular gaming subreddits, have either confirmed their participation, are asking members for their thoughts, or will also take more limited action.
These include r/gaming with its 37 million members, r/PS5 with its 3.3 million members, r/minecraft with its 7 million members and r/wow with its 2.3 million members. Meanwhile, at r/pcgaming (3.2 million members), mods ask users for their opinions before making a decision, while r/nintendo goes into a “read-only/restricted mode” that isn’t quite as severe as banning of the entire game subreddit down.
