Step 1: A backpedal to their roots, openness and FOSS leaning development. Allow reasonably cheap API access that still gives them some money from the AI trawlers but allows 3rd parties to function, stop blasting me with gigantic notification on my mobile browser to use the terrible official app every time I view a thread (or even literally forcing you off the page period if its 'nsfw' content like elden ring threads, apparently??)

Step 2: Focus on genuine usability. The official app is DOG ASS. The "new" reddit experience is a nightmare compared to old reddit. Videos STILL don't load and run properly, after literally 5 or 6 years. Straight up embarrassing stuff for software developers.

Step 3: Take a genuine stance on moderation and content. Either direction; free-for-all where only the clearly illegal is removed, or tightly moderated with global rules. This current system is a completely broken mess, you'll get the_donald literally breeding terrorists in the open for years, but I can't use call another user an "asshole loser" without getting kicked out of a subreddit? I just dont think the weird federalist style subreddit system works all that well. Global, clear, enforced rules.

If they did these things I think I would return. The real crazy thing is that they could do all of these things and still increase profitability. If the official app was actually good, more people would use it, and the massive amount of calls home and data collection it does would be way more profitable. Jump on the bandwagon, make a reddit LLM chat-bot that is fed only on reddit threads, it would probably be genuinely decent. Or at least make reddit search work, you would siphon off a ton of google search traffic. you know. innovate, at all, even a little. The money would come in. But not AS FAST AS POSSIBLE AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE I WANT TO SCROOGE MCDUCK THIS SHIT levels, and thats what the ownership and (soon to be) shareholders will push them towards. So none of this will happen, sadly.