Cheap API access was letting the AI platforms pull Reddit data directly via API. That’s why the “fix” was making API access expensive, so that buying the data from Reddit instead becomes the more cost-effective solution.
Reddit’s not (as) worried about gathering more data to sell, they’re worried about selling the years of data they already have.
You can just click Follow and start following someone. You don’t have to perform a copy-paste dance to bring the username back to your instance and do the following there.