Your "32 days" timeline you keep going on about is false no matter what way you look at it.

Apollo has known since April API pricing was coming, and there was no way their existing "pay once, use it forever" or even the $12.99 per year model was going to be sustainable - particularly given how many free users they float monthly.

Not knowing the exact fee in advance is completely irrelevant. The infrastructure needed to be built to support a monthly subscription model, freemium models, or whatever they needed to do to pivot and remain in business.

100% of the reason people use Apollo is because of the data and community Reddit has built. Apollo basically leached off that data, and made a profit while doing so. Any sound business operator would understand and plan for risks that endanger their business. Apollo failed to take action in a timely manner, and failed to mitigate risks to it's business.

Now they're being asked to pay for the API access that makes Apollo's business possible - and even if the API fees were 1/4 of the proposed amount, Apollo was going to need to change their model. That is the point you, and many others seem to be missing - Apollo was not going to survive paying anything for API access - Apollo had no plan.

I cannot make it any more clear - Apollo failed to plan for, and mitigate risks and failed to take corrective actions in time to save their business.

Apollo was run like a hobby side-project - not a business.