Seen for the first time since her controversial firing these exclusive pictures show former Reddit Director of Talent, Victoria Taylor out in New York today as the company reels in the wake of her termination.

The pictures were taken just 24 hours after interim Reddit CEO Ellen Pao was forced to issue a groveling apology following Taylor’s shock dismissal.

The interim CEO wrote a post to the website, ‘We screwed up. Today, we acknowledge this long history of mistakes.’ But her words have done little to quell either the surge of support for Taylor or the hostility towards Pao.

More than 190,000 people have signed an online petition demanding that Pao step down following her decision to fire popular employee Taylor.

In row: Victoria Taylor in New York today. She is not being reinstated at Reddit despite the anger of moderators and a petition of 190,000 names calling for his reinstatement

Staying silent: Taylor declined to comment but has received huge backing, including a tweet from Lorde

Today singer Lorde became the latest celebrity to wade in in support of Taylor with the tweet ‘rule #1 in [Reddit’s] pr handbook was always VICTORIA STAYS.’

Taylor was best known for running Ask Me Anything and became synonymous with the section as the interface between high-profile guests and Reddit’s massive community.

When approached by Daily Mail Online Taylor declined to comment on the situation in which she now finds herself.

But last week the beleaguered 30-year-old gave some clue as to her state of mind when she tweeted a simple thank you to her supporters, ‘Thank you to everyone for their good wishes and support. Love you guys.’

News of Taylor’s shock sacking broke last Thursday and proved the catalyst for an explosion of months of growing tensions between Reddit the company and Reddit the community.

Some Reddit users made numbers of popular subsections inaccessible in a ‘revolt’ over the former communications director’s dismissal. Volunteer moderators who work with paid administrators to run the site’s discussion threads turned many of the ‘subreddits’ dark.

Admission: 'We screwed up,' Ellen Pao wrote in a post to the website as a Change.org petition calling for her resignation hit 190,000 signatures. But she

Pao apologized for poor communication after popular sections of the site were inaccessible on Thursday and Friday because moderators turned threads private (pictured) during a protest

Pao's apology included a list of areas where she says the site will soon be improved

TEN MOST POPULAR SUBREDDITS THAT WERE SHUT DOWN /r/AskReddit - 8,915,996 subscibers /r/funny - 8,910,496 /r/pics - 8,821,937 /r/todayilearned - 8,780,615 /r/IAmA - 8,519,606 /r/videos - 8,080,586 /r/gaming - 8,020,785 /r/movies - 7,660,540 /r/Music - 7,389,768 /r/technology - 5,146,648 Advertisement

They have since been restored. But Pao’s attempts to placate her many and vocal detractors has had little impact as the Change.org petition calling for her resignation continues to accumulate signatures.

The executive has been called Chairman Pao, in a racially-charged reference to her Asian-American background.

According to her own social media post Taylor is ‘dazed’ by both her firing and its fallout. She joined Reddit in 2013 to be its first director of communications. At the time she was described by the company as an, ‘advocate of all things reddit for years.’ She focused on the Ask Me Anything [AMA] section of the site from the get go and soon became synonymous with the popular section.

Moderators were quick to lash out following her dismissal which happened with seemingly little or no communication with them.

In a blog post on a subbreddit called /r/OutOfTheLoop one of the moderators of /r/IAmA known as karmanaut expressed dismay at both the decision and the way it was handled.

‘Today we learned that Victoria was unexpectedly let go from her position from Reddit,’ they wrote. ‘We all had the rug ripped out from under us and feel betrayed.’