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I was initially going to ask the question of Why was Scrappy-Doo introduced to the Scooby-Doo series, but that seems to be answered succinctly by the below Wikipedia paragraph:

In 1979, Scooby's tiny nephew Scrappy-Doo was added to both the series and the billing, in an attempt to boost Scooby-Doo's slipping ratings. The 1979–80 episodes, aired under the new title Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo as an independent half-hour show, succeeded in regenerating interest in the show.

However on skimming the article, I can't see anything about a negative fan reaction.

When did that happen?

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After hunting around I found this explanation on TV Tropes:

The Trope Namer is Scrappy-Doo from Scooby-Doo. Scrappy was introduced in 1979 as Scooby-Doo's nephew in a bid to revitalize the franchise, whose popularity was beginning to wane. It should be clearly noted that it did work; children adored the character, and thus Scooby-Doo remained a staple of Saturday morning entertainment. But with the rise of usernet groups, it was discovered that Scrappy-Doo was hated by many longtime fans, which was probably only aggravated by the fact that they had grown out of Scooby-Doo's target audience. Some hated Scrappy because they perceived him as being responsible for the franchise dumping half the main cast, switching to a Three Shorts format, and introducing real monsters, which occurred the season after Scrappy was introduced. The shorts format lasted for three seasons and gained neutral to positive reception, but many fans never warmed to the Genre Shift.

Emphasis mine.

So it looks like an older generation fomented this dislike of Scrappy, even blaming his introduction on some big format changes.

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    As a child, I hatred scrappy-doo from the moment he was introduced. For what it’s worth, I was an unusually grumpy and cynical child.
    – Todd Wilcox
    Jul 6 at 16:02
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    Older doesn't just mean age. Scrappy was literally an annoying younger sibling. That means that annoying younger siblings felt a connection and loved him as the comedic star of the show. But it also means that older siblings saw the character as a childish distraction from the things they wanted to watch. And the younger siblings tended to either outgrow the character and stop caring or they became the older sibling as their family grew and they began to hate the character they way their older siblings did. That's what I saw in my own family and in my friend's families, at any rate.
    – krb
    Jul 9 at 0:30

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