Reddit is following in Twitter’s footsteps and charging third-party apps for entry to their APIs. The consequence: Apollo, one of the crucial standard Reddit apps for iPhone, is shutting down totally after figuring out that the brand new pricing would value it $2 million a month. RIF, one other standard app, is calling it quits for a similar cause. After the API information, a number of main Reddit communities are blacked out this week in protest.
Reddit has each proper to cost for its API, legally talking, and it stands to achieve if extra individuals use the (horrible) official app. Reddit CEO Steve Huffman argued in an AMA that the modifications are being overblown. Comments in that thread are, let’s consider, lower than pleasant to the corporate line.
If all of this leaves you questioning what may occur to the posts and feedback you’ve made on Reddit through the years, you’re not alone. David Brownman, a programmer based mostly in San Mateo, California, was questioning precisely that.
“I have put so much into Reddit over the years, and I didn’t like the idea of it being inaccessible to me,” he tells me. “It’s my content, and I’ll need to be a steward of it if Reddit won’t. I also reference old posts of mine a lot, so having full text search was important to me.”
With these issues in thoughts, Brownman wished an offline archive of his posts. Here’s how one can get one too, both by asking Reddit or by utilizing a software Brownman constructed to obtain it your self.
Ask Reddit for Your Data
Reddit has a type the place you’ll be able to request a replica of your information. The course of can take up to 30 days, after which you’re going to get a non-public message in your Reddit account with a obtain hyperlink. The information comes within the type of CSV information that you may open utilizing Microsoft Excel or any textual content editor. There are separate information to your feedback, your posts, your voting historical past, and your chats, amongst different issues.
This technique has just a few downsides. First, CSV information is usually a little unwieldy, particularly in order for you to search. Second, there’s a delay, which is annoying in case you simply need to obtain the info and transfer on along with your life. Still, it’s simple, and for most individuals, that is most likely one of the simplest ways to again up their Reddit content material.
Download Your Reddit Data Yourself
If you’d fairly not look ahead to Reddit to ship your information, or would like to hold your information in a searchable archive, you should use Brownman’s software, reddit-user-to-sqlite. This command line utility can obtain the entire public archive of any Reddit consumer and compile it in an SQLite database file. Just understand that this technique will cease engaged on July 1, 2023, when the API change happens.
Brownman affords a weblog publish outlining the software with just a few directions—in case you’re snug with the command line, I like to recommend following the directions there. For everybody else, don’t fear: It’s not as arduous because it sounds.
First you will have to set up Python. For Windows customers, that is greatest achieved by downloading and operating the installer to your laptop. After putting in Python, you will have to set up pipx. On Windows, that is greatest achieved with the next instructions, which you’ll run within the Command Prompt or PowerShell: