If you don't think of it in the context of Reddit's bullshit, the idea of having special avatars that you have to pay for as a form of monetization isn't the worst thing imo. As long as it doesn't negatively affect users and isn't on top of other predatory forms of monetization.
The speculative tone is interesting since they did do it, and it opened a revenue stream for both the company and contributing artists. It isn't saving the company but it was undoubtedly successful and proves that there are people that value and invest in their online brand outside of the crypto Twitter bubble.
True, a nice horse armor is not that bad if at a decent price, but it's after that you have to be careful to not exaggerate and drift off in waay worst, although I couldn't pay for something like that personally