Reddit,
You created a wonderful platform. You created a place that was organized in a logical way, but open and free enough for people to express and share. Over the years, many talented developers have created things to make your platform better. We had third part apps on mobile devices and Reddit Enhancement Suite on the browser. These people continued the work you did and made Reddit an even better place. I can’t imagine using Reddit without them.
One particularly good app on iOS was Alien Blue. It was so good that you bought them. I was excited for Alien Blue to become part of Reddit and I was looking forward to seeing what you would to improve this application. Sadly, it doesn’t seem that you did anything with it. Your mobile app was very different and felt inferior in many ways. Once I discovered Apollo it was an easy sell. I could use it for free, but I was more than happy to pay the developer as it was such a fantastic application and I wanted to compensate him for his hard work.
Reddit you continued to be an amazing place. Now that these apps are gone, I started to realize that in all the years that you have been there, helping others learn, grow, discover, and create, you did not do any of these things. You did not improve the experience, you let others do it.
You did not improve the experience on the web, you created a new interface that was so unpopular that a large percentage of people still use the old one. You did not improve the mobile app; you told people that they cannot use other mobile apps. You seem to have decided that people will use Reddit the way you want them to use Reddit. A way that people do not want to use Reddit.
We live in a world where technology is not expensive. It is accessible and there are a lot of intelligent people out there who know how to work with it. Passionate developers have created alternatives that function in the same way. These alternatives cannot be controlled as there is no king. These alternatives will allow people to use the platform the way they want to use the platform. They have to because there is no one to tell them they cannot use it.
I am not asking you to backtrack, make changes, or improved the experience. I am here to thank you for all of the things you have helped me accomplish. But more importantly, I am here to say goodbye.