We did the same thing at reddit. If someone was abusing the site we would redirect them at the load balancer to a single server with an extra sleep in it.
Parent comment was a out implementing a dark nudge to encourage behavior. Next comment was from someone who worked for a company that does it. Next comment was about another poorly implemented dark pattern at same site. Comment is on point. Relevance identified.
I'm pretty sure it has at times even said browsing will be faster in the app than in mobile browser. It wouldn't be surprising if that Very dark pattern was applied as part of pushing the app.
Adding dark patterns and then telling the users to decide for themselves is itself a dark pattern: it's not actually letting users decide for themselves, it's instead punishing users who actively chose not to do what the site wanted them to do.
I am not talking about asshole design. Users know that there is an app store (proof: the huge usage of messengers like Whatsapp). If they want the app they know where to find it. There is no need to applying asshole (or braindead) design to the site.
You can easily game reddit and other similar popularity contest sites or at least sort of. Play their game. E.g. if you delete your own messages immediately after you notice they get a negative momentum you will be quickly considered a model citizen (because you will eventually only show a positive impact to the site and it won't even take long to show because even a couple of days of posting may give that impression).
'jedberg hasn't worked at reddit for years, it's pretty ridiculous to use "you" and "your" there. Further, he was never in marketing, he was basically just a sysadmin. There's really no charitable interpretation of your comment that isn't just "Hey, let's yell at a guy who isn't currently and has literally never been in a position to where he might have been responsible for Annoyance!"
I just wanted a jab at reddit, cuz this week I can't even browse it because "this community is available in the app" (after years of marke... mental abuse of asking me to use an app). Nothing against the guy, he used "we", I used "you", I'm sure he is a cool guy, and I hope its the charitable interpretation.
FWIW, I feel your pain as a daily user of the site myself. I hold no ill will against you for taking it out on me. When I left I specifically said that users can continue to blame me for all problems. :)
I wasn't aware that some communities are now limited to the app only. I haven't run into any yet.
> I do wonder if this scheme was introduced to monetize users
Probably. As a shareholder I get it. The site needs to make money so it can keep providing the service it provides. And ads are the best way to do that.
I also get it from a development standpoint. It takes effort to maintain a frontend, and maintaining two of them takes twice as much effort. With limited resources, I can see why it makes sense to focus on the mobile interface and let the web interface fall by the wayside.
I'm not entirely sure I'd have made a different decision if I still worked there. I don't know enough about the internal structure or costs or revenue to say for sure.
I can say that I know the people in charge, and they are good people, and if this is the choice they made, it was probably for good reason.
They want to redirect users from a relatively open platform they can't control (e.g. adblockers, browser extensions) to one they can control but for some reason can't manage properly (mobile app).
Seriously, the number of times the Reddit app hasn't worked but Apollo has is kind of ridiculous.
I wouldn't even mind using the app if it didn't chew data like it does.
When I had it installed (up to last week) it was using more than 10x anything else on my iphone. I was definitely not using reddit enough to justify that.
