> A business, Apollo, made an offer (lifetime access) to gain marketshare. It worked as Apollo is the defacto Reddit App for iOS. Now they cannot hold true to their offer, so they're forced to refund it. This is the price of the bargain Apollo made.
That's practically the definition of tortious interference.
"The most common form of [tortious interference], however, occurs when an individual forces or induces someone to break a contract they have with a third party. This can happen in many ways: someone could offer below market prices to induce a breach, they could blackmail or threaten someone into violating a contract, or they could make it impossible for the other person to perform and receive the benefits of that contract - by refusing to transport goods, for instance."
If a landlord promises the tenant that he will not exercise his right to terminate a lease, and relying upon that promise the tenant spends money improving the premises, the doctrine of promissory estoppel may prevent the landlord from exercising a right to terminate, even though his promise might not otherwise have been legally binding as a contract. The landlord is precluded from asserting a specific right."
I believe his point is that since the creator of Apollo was in frequent conversations with Reddit, who apparently told him they weren’t planning big changes to the API anytime soon, that then making it impossible for him to deliver the app by instead charging an exorbitant amount (very shortly after telling him there wouldn’t be changes), then that would qualify as forcing him to break the contract with his users. On the other hand, you could argue that since the promise was “lifetime,” this put to much up in the air (vs. like 5 years or something). On the other other hand, you could argue that there is an implied possibility that the app could shut down, given that Reddit itself could for example close down and make it impossible to deliver, which I think courts would plausibly accept as a sufficient delivery of services. Anyways, to the original point, I’m not sure what a court would find, but hopefully now at least the comparison he’s drawing is clear.
The act that is alleged to be tortious interference has to be improper for it to actually potentially be tortious interference (see farther down on the page you quoted).
There's nothing obviously improper about a site replacing a free API with a paid API even if it causes problems for those who relied on the API being free.
No, it's not the definition of tortious interference.
Reddit did not force or induce Apollo to break a contract with its own customers. Apollo unilaterally chose to do that because it could not afford continued access to Reddit's APIs, which Reddit was not under a legal obligation to continue providing at historical rates that Apollo had based its entire product around, despite long-standing advice not to do so.
> Reddit did not force or induce Apollo to break a contract with its own customers. Apollo unilaterally chose to do that because it could not afford continued access to Reddit's APIs,
"I didn't refuse to transport your goods, I just said it would cost a billion dollars per pound to do it and you couldn't afford it" is not the gotcha that you think it is. The law is technical but it's enforced by humans.
It's straightforward: Apollo and Reddit have a longstanding business relationship, via these APIs that Reddit has provided for a long time at zero cost. Reddit generally no longer wants third parties to use the API, so they are increasing the price to a level that they know will cause everyone to balk (other third-party clients are closing up too) so that they can direct that traffic to their own native client and first-party sites, while knowing that Apollo has these long-standing business relationships of their own that are built on this relationship with Reddit.
In short, reddit is deliberately taking action to sabotage and cause economic harm to a business partner by changing aspects of the relationship that make it impossible for the partner to fulfill their contracts to third parties, so that Reddit can direct that business to themselves instead.
That is an improper taking under tortious interference, and the rest of the tests (intent actual economic loss - not just refunds but future income, etc) are trivially satisfied here.
I know people are libertarians here but the right to swing your fist ends at someone else's face, and legally speaking if you take actions that you know will result in a business partner being forced to sustain economic losses due to your improper breaking of your business relationship with them, you are generally liable for that damage you cause to the partner. That is the basic concept of tortious interference, you're paying for the damage you caused to your business partner. Swing your fist and hit someone's face and you get to pay for the surgery.
(IANAL and Reddit's lawyers would obviously say their conduct is proper, but, generally this is the type of situation where people can unexpectedly get themselves into legitimate legal trouble based on actions they think are perfectly legitimate. And generally they may have been legitimate if you didn't have this prior relationship, that changes things! It's different to not build an API at all, vs having the API be free and have third parties start selling clients and then to stop doing the API.)
(As a sibling comment notes, estoppel is another - if you promise something to someone, even a verbal promise, and they take a financially detrimental action on the expectation that you will follow through on your side of the promise and you don't, then you are generally liable for the financial harm you have caused them too. Libertarianism doesn't mean you can wiggle out of contracts, even verbal ones.)
Apollo and Reddit do not appear to be business partners. Nor does Apollo seem to have any contractual agreement with Reddit, outside of the API usage agreement.
The API terms were lasted updated May 25, 2016. These include this language:
> a. Fees. Reddit reserves the right to charge fees for future use or access to the Reddit APIs, rates to be determined in Reddit’s sole discretion.
I assume these are the terms that Apollo are bound to. If that's the case, I don't see how you can support your claim. Reddit is using it's contractual right.
> Apollo and Reddit do not appear to be business partners. Nor does Apollo seem to have any contractual agreement with Reddit, outside of the API usage agreement.
Sorry, I am confused what you are arguing here. If you think a usage agreement is binding they are certainly business partners. They may still be business partners or generally covered by tortious interference even if they do not have an explicit contract either.
This is quite a wide legal net by design - it is a "swing your fist and hit someone and their lawyers may have something to say about it" area of law, of course it's a wide net. You really don't even have to have an explicit contract.
I'm not a libertarian, I'm a lawyer, and I'm looking at this from the legal perspective.
Reddit's Data API TOS has always allowed it the right to start charging for access. That it chose not to do so until recently was its prerogative. That it chooses to do so now, is also it's prerogative.
This is not a unfair taking, since Reddit isn't taking anything from Christian, they are simply no longer freely providing something.
This is not an issue of estoppel, since Reddit never promised to make their API free forever. And Reddit gave him due notice, as required by their TOS, of changes that would take effect...several months after notice was given of the changes...
This is not tortious inteference, since Apollo could have continued to provide Reddit services to their customers, though this might have required Christian to change his business model.
This is not slander, since on the call Christian clearly suggests to Reddit to give him $10 million and he'll go away and not make a fuss about things.
It's irrelevant that they have a "prior relationship" since that means nothing in this context, since Christian did not have a binding contractual relationship that entitled Christian to perpetual free access to the Reddit Data API.
> This is not tortious inteference, since Apollo could have continued to provide Reddit services to their customers, though this might have required Christian to change his business model.
So, this is the one thing I'm not sure I entirely agree with. While it's true that Apollo could have changed its business model, they only had 30 days to migrate users to a new business model, including some users that are on a yearly model.
Furthermore, Reddit had previously stated to Christian that the timeline was flexible, and that they'd be open to extending it. They then walked back on that promise, leaving Apollo scrambling to move all their existing users to the new model in very limited time. And that's after telling christian multiple time earlier in the year that no change to the pricing policy was being considered for at least the year to come.
There's essentially no solution for Christian here. They don't have the money to pay for the usage of their existing 50k yearly that won't migrate for up to 12 months.
While I'm not a lawyer, I'd be very surprised if a case couldn't be made with this behavior.
Not that it'd ever go to court anyways - it'd be a huge time and money sink with unclear outcomes. Better to focus on the next steps.
While I'm not a lawyer, I'd be very surprised if a case couldn't be made with this behavior.
I am a lawyer. I can say, with 100% certainty, that this case would never make it to trial. It's unlikely that Christian would even make it to discovery, as based on the facts stated, by Christian himself, even viewed in the light most favorable to Christian, he does not have any colorable legal claims.
You should read the article. Christian recorded calls during which said that no increase was under consideration and that any change was "at least a year away".
I did read the article. And I listened to the recording. As a businessperson, Christian should know that the salespersons statements were not a binding promise, since there was no mutual consideration and those statements were not reflected in the actual written agreement he would have signed.
As I said, I'm looking at this from the legal perspective, not the emotional perspective.
> A business, Apollo, made an offer (lifetime access) to gain marketshare. It worked as Apollo is the defacto Reddit App for iOS. Now they cannot hold true to their offer, so they're forced to refund it. This is the price of the bargain Apollo made.
That's practically the definition of tortious interference.
https://www.findlaw.com/smallbusiness/liability-and-insuranc...
"The most common form of [tortious interference], however, occurs when an individual forces or induces someone to break a contract they have with a third party. This can happen in many ways: someone could offer below market prices to induce a breach, they could blackmail or threaten someone into violating a contract, or they could make it impossible for the other person to perform and receive the benefits of that contract - by refusing to transport goods, for instance."