Nelson’s Weblog: culture / apis-for-content-sites-must-be-free:
Social media businesses should not charge* for APIs. If a company like Reddit or Twitter derives most of its value from content that users write for free then it must provide APIs for anyone to download and manipulate that content.
He continues later.
The key thing here is social media sites don’t produce content. They merely host it. Millions of users create the content expecting it will be widely available. Locking down an API breaks that social contract.
To quote much more is to simply repost it, but I agree with Nelson. It’s a quick read and worth your time.