zlacker

Late to the party and this may get buried, but wanted to add a contextual POV. I'm an Apollo user, and I am also someone who was Reddit's earliest enterprise advertisers. As in, the campaigns I've green lit are perhaps still in their advertising media decks as case studies.

Reddit for the past few years have been changing the UX to benefit their revenue streams. Visit any reddit thread on a mobile browser, and get a nag to download the official app. Their app is less likely to be blocked by ad blockers, has advertising SDKs, and can link advertising parameters.

I believe certain threads need you to login. It is also in their best interest to find opportunities for you to login to again link browse behavior. Forgot to mention, the app also allows a logged in state to persist easier than browser.

TL;DR All of Reddit's UX decisions have been to grow their revenue stream.

Do they have the right to do so? Of course. Does it suck for this audience in particular, probably. In my opinion, they will lose their early adopters and perhaps some power users. Is that a risk they are taking? Clearly.