Despite widespread protest, Reddit CEO says company is ‘not negotiating’ on 3rd-party app charges

WASHINGTON — If you hopped on Reddit to scroll through your favorite forums this week, you may have encountered “private” or “restricted” messages. “The problem with this one is it’s not going to change anything because we made a business decision that we’re not negotiating on.” Organizers of the protest say Reddit’s new policy threatens to end key ways of historically customizing the platform using an API, or application programming interface, which allows computer programs to communicate with each another. The company’s response to the blackout has fueled further outrage among protest organizers, who accuse Reddit of trying to remove moderators — or “mods” — of subreddits who are protesting this week. Subreddit “mods” are volunteers who often use tools outside of the official app to keep their forums free of spam and hateful content, for example, and many of them are angry with Reddit’s new fees. “We didn’t ban third-party apps — we said, ‘You need to cover your costs.’” Reddit’s changes to its API coincide with the San Francisco-based company’s reported plans to go public later this year.