Earlier this year, Reddit caused an uproar when it announced changes to its API, requiring payment for any scraping of its data. This decision led to widespread protest on the platform, with users abandoning subreddits in solidarity with third-party app developers who were effectively locked out. Reddit’s stance extended to search engines and other companies seeking to utilize its data for proprietary products.
Reports emerged of a $60 million annual deal with Google for direct access to Reddit’s data, along with a similar agreement with OpenAI. This allowed Reddit posts to appear in responses from OpenAI’s chatbots, such as ChatGPT. However, a recent report from The Verge has revealed a significant escalation in Reddit’s stance.
The platform has now implemented an update prohibiting all web crawling, or data gathering, on its website. This effectively bans search engines like Microsoft’s Bing and DuckDuckGo from crawling Reddit content. Consequently, Reddit posts will no longer appear in search results on these banned engines. Microsoft has confirmed this change in a statement posted on Search Engine Land.
The only search engine currently permitted to display Reddit content remains Google, owing to its annual $60 million payment for access to the platform’s data.
