As many of you are already aware, Reddit has announced that they are updating their API pricing model. The new prices, which will go into effect on July 1st, are so exorbitant that all existing third-party apps (such as Apollo, RiF, Relay, BaconReader, and Narwhal) will be forced to shut down. Apollo specifically would need to pay Reddit $20 million per year to continue operating, a sum totally beyond their means.

Once this change has been made, the only way to view Reddit on a mobile device will be through the official app. In addition to a generally inferior interface and extremely lackluster moderation tools relative to the various 3rd party apps, Reddit's official app offers a terrible experience for visually impaired users. Reddit has been well aware of this issue for years, but have never prioritized it, and now they are pulling the rug out from under the visually impaired community, with nothing more than a promise that they'll make their own app accessible...eventually. Reddit's recent update in response to the growing uproar makes no mention of this issue, and that is not acceptable.

A sitewide protest has been arranged, and as of this writing over 2400 subreddits have agreed to participate. r/lgbtqalabama has decided to join them, and like the rest, we will be taking the subreddit fully private on Monday, June 12. The subreddit will not be accessible to any Redditors during this time. How long we stay that way will depend on how Reddit chooses to respond.

We encourage anyone interested in contributing to this movement to reach out to the admins themselves (via modmail at r/reddit), or to moderators of subreddits you frequent. Tell them you support this protest and you want them to take action.

We want to be clear about a couple of things: if this were simply a matter of Reddit making a bad business decision, we would not be participating in this protest. If they want to kill their own platform by ruining the user experience for everyone, we have no real objections. However, their passive hostility toward Reddit's visually impaired community is simply unacceptable to us.

Furthermore, we strongly encourage everyone who supports this protest to stay off Reddit entirely for the duration. Subreddits going dark is one thing, but a decline in active users will send an even stronger message.

To reiterate:

• Beginning Monday, June 12, this subreddit will be inaccessible until further notice.
• We strongly encourage supporters to avoid the platform entirely during this time.