I have a feeling like he is being squeezed by the investors. It feels like they want a tiktok/Instagram clone and he is the one that has to tell the Reddit community.
I don’t think this was his vision for the site or he would have done it years ago.
Like it doesn’t make it less shitty but more understandable I guess?
There is an interview with him on the verge where he lays his numbers out. One big point was that the people that already bought a yearlong subscription need to be served at great loss. He says it would cost $50,000 for July. Then ofcourse some subscriptions would expire but it would still be a huge chunk of money that had to be paid every month decreasing over the next year.
I don’t know either way but he doesn’t seem like the type to play foul. I’ll edit this comment with the interview if I find it.
Found it on lemmy already lol: https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/13/23759180/reddit-protest-private-apollo-christian-selig-subreddit