[MattBearman]

I’ve not casually browsed reddit since apollo shut down, occasionally I’ll end up on a post from a search, or my wife will show me something she’s seen, but that’s it. I was a pretty heavy user before as well.

Before apollo stopped I had set my phone to limit me to half an hour a day, a limit I hit almost every day, and regularly exceeded.

I don’t really miss it though, so it’s probably been a net benefit for me, but I’m still pissed off at how it went down

[appplication]

I would agree with just about all of this. Personally, I was ok with it being deleted because of how much time I truthfully wasted on Apollo.

I also deleted all of my post data on impulse one day, and I definitely regret doing that, at least a little. My comment history was 10+ years of my own often detailed thoughts on the world. It was a mini-timeline of who I was, digitally and anonymously.

Now that I’m a little older, I’m a fair bit less interested in engaging with most internet content. I write a few comments here, but I’m not sure there will ever be a platform I really comment on as consistently again.

I don’t know that I fully am into the principles opposing the 3rd party app shutdown, but it all seemed sort of sad how it played out. There, in broad daylight we had this massively democratic venue, or at least many of its members thought of it that way. It had it’s golden moment to band together and show the power of their collective voices. And they were just… unceremoniously and unquestionably crushed. Principled moderators humiliated and forced to publicly recant or be silently shuffled out.

I get why Reddit the company felt entitled to do what they did. It was just sad to see the illusion of free, self-forming digital communities be swept away and replaced by a more sober reality. One in which almost all of the internet as we know it is really just a series of corporate and well tended gardens, with public passage at the sole behest of our faceless corporate overlords.