Here’s the note Reddit sent to moderators threatening them if they don’t reopen

It was well known and understood that Reddit would do this, going as far as to replace entire mod teams, even before the blackout started. The hope was that investors would put pressure on Reddit to agree to mods and 3rd party devs requests. But not enough support materialized, and that left the mods between a rock and a hard place.

I don't fault the mods for making the decisions they did. If the sub is going to reopen anyways and the mod can do nothing about it, better to at least have a mod stay on who cared enough to try to do the right thing once upon a time.

At this point I'd say the onus is now on us, the regular users. Let us move our content away from Reddit - without that, with the content on a replacement - Reddit will have a much harder time recovering.

Everyone's trying to kill reddit, but that isn't something we have the power to do. There is no offensive action we can take that will bring reddit down. I wish that idea would dissipate already.

What we can do, the only thing we can do, the sole action that is within our power, is to do nothing. Walk away, close that chapter, allow reddit to fade. As we have seen time and time again, reddit is perfectly capable of killing reddit; we have only to step back and watch it happen...

...without actually giving them traffic, of course.
- I'm not going to look down on those who also stay - this all happened so fast, and many people need time to absorb it all, especially those less tech-savvy. But mostly yes: we need content creators in the new places or there's no reason for anyone to come TO anywhere (except in the short-term it would help for them to just not go THERE, in case that helps force the issue for him to be asked to step down, but we can't control others, only lower the barrier for them to make alternate choices).
- You can delete your history. While I've heard that your posts may reappear due to backups, why not make it hard on Reddit as you close the door behind you? They're your posts, your user history. The more people that delete their history, the more frustrating it is for Reddit overall.

i'm here with popcorn for the big subs that get their mod team stripped and new mods lazily installed by reddit that are absolute power tripping maniacs who chart the whole subreddit into an extremist political course. it's happened before with mod 'takeovers', it will happen again.

the note:

Hi everyone

We wanted to ensure that you are aware that the API update does not impact moderation bots or sitewide tools to control spam or remove harmful content. You can find more details in this article in our help center. You may have seen posts or received messages from users telling these tools are going away or are somehow impacted, but this is not the case.

We are also aware that some members of your mod team have expressed that they want to close your community indefinitely. We are reaching out to find out if this is the consensus reached by the mod team.

Subreddits exist for the benefit of the community of users who come to them for support and belonging and in the end, moderators are stewards of these spaces and in a position of trust. Your users rely on your community for information, support, entertainment, and finding connection with others who have similar interests. Ensuring that communities are able to remain stable and actively moderated is incredibly important to the people seeking out these spaces to make and foster connections.

If there are mods here who are willing to work towards reopening this community, we are willing to work with you to process a Top Mod Removal request or reorder the mod team to achieve this goal if mods higher up the list are hindering reopening. We would handle this request and any retaliation attempts here in this modmail chain immediately.

Our goal is to work with the existing mod team to find a path forward and make sure your subreddit is made available for the community which makes its home here. If you are not able or willing to reopen and maintain the community, please let us know.

My god that is scummy. I am getting the sense that they will just force re-open all of the private subreddits, and Reddit will just continue on as if nothing happened. They'll be continuing on without any of my traffic though. I am done with companies manipulating and exploiting their users to generate profits.

The continuous lies from Reddit is what drove me away from the platform. Literally the same day they said they wouldn't force open subs, they also threatened subs that mods will be replaced. How can anyone trust a word that comes out of their mouths, especially with these "planned features" that have been in the works for years

Saw this predicted by many people right from the beginning of the protest talks, but it still stings to see it play out. What a sinister move.

Its sad to see a site we all loved go (even further) down the tubes,but we all left for a reason. Let em reopen. That way all the remaining people will be the trolls,provocateurs,and generally toxic asshats. Reddit can take voats place for all I care. I'm digging this place more anyway. Ad many have said,this feels like for me,2012 reddit.

I deleted all my posts and walked away. I'm realizing that Reddit had me stagnant and I'm now discovering new things.

I feel like it's a whole new world of social media for me. I've found myself joining smaller communities across the Lemmyverse and in Discord, and it feels more engaging and less toxic. I've even picked up Tik Tok after years of Redditors telling me it's the plague, and I've found that it has more welcoming niche communities (like Booktok, Writertok, Tears of the Kingdom) than Reddit ever had.