Reddit Blackout: CEO downplays protest. Subreddits vow to keep fighting.

The 48-hour Reddit “Blackout” is technically coming close to an end. However, the company’s blasé attitude about this issue, which clearly many of its users feel passionate about, may end up backfiring. And that scheduled two-day protest may be extended on some subreddit communities…indefinitely.On Monday, thousands of subreddits went private, blocking access to the years-worth of content that fill each niche community. Why? These subreddits are protesting recent changes at the company to get rid of free API access for developers. In its place, Reddit is rolling out a high-priced, pay-as-you-go model for developers seeking API access for its apps.  Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) One of Reddit’s most popular third-party apps, Apollo for Reddit, has already announced that it would have to shut down due to these changes as the solo developer running the app could not afford the newly-necessary $20 million per year in API costs.Fast forward to today. On Tuesday, more than 24-hours into the protest, The Verge published a company-wide internal memo from Reddit CEO Steve Huffman in which Huffman downplayed the impact of the users’ protests.”There’s a lot of noise with this one,” wrote Huffman. “Among the noisiest we’ve seen. Please know that our teams are on it, and like all blowups on Reddit, this one will pass as well.” SEE ALSO: Reddit went down amid blackout protest over company’s new policy “We absolutely must ship what we said we would,” he continued, referring to the root cause of the…Reddit Blackout: CEO downplays protest. Subreddits vow to keep fighting.