Alessandro Nodari of 09 June 2023, 08:59
If you like to explore Reddit (here’s how to download a video from the platform) on iPhones, it is possible that you use or at least have tried Apollo, probably the best client for the platform.
The app is so popular that when the developer had the idea to take advantage of the Dynamic Island of the new iPhones to insert “pixelated” animals, the same Apple had accepted the proposal with enthusiasm, collaborating in the realization (here you will find the best apps for Dynamic Island, including Apollo). The idea was so successful that a separate app was born, Pixel Palswhich is only for that.
But now Apollo developer Christian Selig has stated that Apollo will close on June 30thwhich surely is a bad tile for the fans.
But what’s going on? In April 2023, Reddit announced a major change to accessing its APIs, which would become a payment. The platform hadn’t announced pricing to begin with, and it looked like things might work out somehow.
But then Reddit communicated i prices, and Sleig, after doing some calculations, realized that the situation was untenable. As Sleig himself writes in a detailed post on Reddit, the cost is “$0.24 per 1,000 API calls”which, with the use of Apollo, would lead to “nearly $2 million a month, or over $20 million a year”.
At this point, Sleig and Reddit’s relationship begins to crack and develops into a full-blown thriller. Reddit accuses Sleig of blackmail ($10 million), threats and behaviors defamatory, things that the developer denies. Sleig addresses all the issues, declaring that he has the conversations recorded and that what Reddit said is not true, as well as explaining that he has thought of various alternative solutions to the closure, such as making the app pay more, but then having decided to close.
On Twitter and Reddit, the developer has already stated that those who have paid for a license will be able to choose whether receive a refund or leave i money as a donation, but many hope that Sleig change your mind or that in any case the situation is resolved in some way.
Which, given the conditions, seems very unlikely, indeed we are convinced that the story will not end here and that Reddit will have something to argue with. At the moment, however, the developer has his own Pixel Pals app, which allows you to decorate the Dynamic Island
The situation of Apollo mirrors what happened with Twitter earlier this year, when the app banned third-party clients and chargedaccess to APIs (which has had different implications in many sectors). At this point, the lesson for developers should be as simple as it is drastic: never base your business onAPI of another.
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