Can Reddit survive as its volunteer workforce close down subreddits and walk away from the site in protest at the management's new policies?

Huffman has said, “We are not in the business of giving that [Reddit’s content] away for free.” That stance makes sense. But it also ignores the reality that all of Reddit’s content has been given to it for free by its millions of users. Further, it leaves aside the fact that the content has been orchestrated by its thousands of volunteer moderators.

touché

  • Square Singer@feddit.deEnglish
    1·
    2 years ago

    That’s what you have Cease and Desists for.

    In Germany and Austria (and potentially other European countries, I don’t know), the recipient of a cease and desist letter has to pay the fee of the lawyer who sent the letter and also damages, unless they want to go to court over the matter. The price is usually ~€200-500.

    These are often sent out in fairly large volumes and are used exactly for this case. Suing for a few €100 is not worth the effort, so you send out written warnings and most people will comply. You only sue in the few cases that won’t comply, so that the threat is real.

    This is mostly an issue for smaller companies, since a few €100 can really throw off their budget.

    Considering that most Lemmy instances are one-man shows that are run as a hobby without any real budget, this is a serious threat here.

    Have a look at the map of Lemmy instances: https://lemmy.fediverse.observer/map

    A huge part of them (over 1/3) are operated out of Germany, and all of them would be vulnerable to this kind of legal attack.