Reddit users are planning a 48-hour blackout to protest its new pricing policy
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- Close to 3,500 subreddit forums plan a 48-hour blackout from Monday.
- Users are protesting Reddit's new pricing policy that charges third-party apps for using its API.
- CEO Steve Huffman announced the changes in April, sparking a backlash from community moderators.
Nearly 3,500 subreddit forums are set to go private for 48 hours on Monday to protest Reddit's new pricing policy, BBC News reported.
Users are unhappy with a series of charges that Reddit introduced for its application programming interface (API), which allows users to display Reddit content on third-party apps such as Apollo, per the report.
Many of these apps have said they will be closing down because of the charges, per The Verge.
A user named u/Toptomcat said in a post on June 2 that numerous subreddits "will be going dark to protest this policy."
"Some will return after 48 hours: others will go away permanently unless the issue is adequately addressed, since many moderators aren't able to put in the work they do with the poor tools available through the official app," u/Toptomcat added.
The user also wrote that if Reddit didn't "fix what they've broken" then the community would take further action.
CEO Steve Huffman shared a Reddit post Friday about the "frustration" experienced by the community as a result of the changes and said he'd spoken with several moderators about it.
"Mods, I appreciate all the time you've spent with us this week, and all the time prior as well. Your feedback is invaluable," Huffman wrote.
"We respect when you and your communities take action to highlight the things you need, including, at times, going private. We are all responsible for ensuring Reddit provides an open accessible place for people to find community and belonging."
Big tech companies such as Google and Microsoft use Reddit data to train their AI systems. Huffman told The New York Times that the decision to charge for using the API was because Reddit didn't want to give away all its "valuable" data for free.
In his post Friday, he added: "Reddit needs to be a self-sustaining business, and to do that, we can no longer subsidize commercial entities that require large-scale data use."
The third-party app Apollo has already said it will shut down on June 30. Its developer, Christian Selig, said in a Reddit post that it's being asked by the platform to pay $0.24 for every 1,000 requests to its API.
The pricing policy will take effect from July 1.
Reddit didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider, made outside normal working hours.