4 ms·

What's with the login wall to read the article? Does every random site need my personal information now?

by kingo55 7y ago

randall 7y ago
It's a paid site.
jvagner 7y ago
It’s a pay site. Logging in gives the, a chance to upsell.
- kingo55 7y ago
  How misleading.
  - Operyl 7y ago
    I mean, given the entire verbiage around the sites login wall, it seemed plenty obvious here.
    - kingo55 7y ago
      Maybe... I don't pay much attention to sales pitches. Just saw 'Read this article for free" and a login button and assumed as much. It'll convert well for them at least.
pcora 7y ago
Many sites do that nowadays. The Information seems to be pretty nice, but it's super expensive. At least to me.
IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago
The Information isn't that random (as the name implies). It's an attempt to create a high-value, investigative tech magazine. The paywall is rather strict and it seems to be aimed at the investor class, so I'm not entirely sure how well it's going because I'm not a subscriber, but I believe I've seen a few important stories that originated with them.
- kingo55 7y ago
  It may be they're a quality site but I've never heard of them before. Not about to hand over personal contact information to an unknown party. If it were the New York Times or some site I've heard of however, I'd happily login.
1f60c 7y ago
You can use a service like Temp Mail[0]. It worked for me. [0]: https://temp-mail.org/ https://temp-mail.org/
- workingpatrick 7y ago
  I also just typed in a non-existent gmail address and it worked.
daybreak 7y ago
Some disposable email sites are blocked on The Information's login wall, even blah@aol.com was rejected (which I found amusing). But it's easy to think of a random email of letters and numbers, and no further validation is required.
codazoda 7y ago
I wish these types of sites were not allowed on Hacker News. I'm not paying for every little news site I read on here (or the big ones). I usually click on the link, realize it's got this crap on it, and bail back out. I don't want to read it and would rather it didn't even show up. For a while I had updated my CSS setup so that these sites would have a strike through on them and I'd go strait to the comments instead of trying to read the story.
- dang 7y ago
  If there's a workaround, it's ok. Users usually post workarounds in the thread. This is in the FAQ at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html and there's more explanation here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989 and https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix&page=0&query=by:dang%20paywall https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme... The Information doesn't have a workaround, but they do unlock many articles for HN readers. I asked them to unlock this one and they did, so everyone who clicks on it from HN can read it now.

What's with the login wall to read the article? Does every random site need my personal information now?

randall 7y ago

It's a paid site.

jvagner 7y ago

It’s a pay site. Logging in gives the, a chance to upsell.

kingo55 7y ago
How misleading.
- Operyl 7y ago
  I mean, given the entire verbiage around the sites login wall, it seemed plenty obvious here.
  - kingo55 7y ago
    Maybe... I don't pay much attention to sales pitches. Just saw 'Read this article for free" and a login button and assumed as much. It'll convert well for them at least.

pcora 7y ago

Many sites do that nowadays. The Information seems to be pretty nice, but it's super expensive. At least to me.

IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago

The Information isn't that random (as the name implies). It's an attempt to create a high-value, investigative tech magazine. The paywall is rather strict and it seems to be aimed at the investor class, so I'm not entirely sure how well it's going because I'm not a subscriber, but I believe I've seen a few important stories that originated with them.

kingo55 7y ago
It may be they're a quality site but I've never heard of them before. Not about to hand over personal contact information to an unknown party. If it were the New York Times or some site I've heard of however, I'd happily login.

1f60c 7y ago

You can use a service like Temp Mail[0]. It worked for me. [0]: https://temp-mail.org/ https://temp-mail.org/

workingpatrick 7y ago
I also just typed in a non-existent gmail address and it worked.

daybreak 7y ago

Some disposable email sites are blocked on The Information's login wall, even blah@aol.com was rejected (which I found amusing). But it's easy to think of a random email of letters and numbers, and no further validation is required.

codazoda 7y ago

I wish these types of sites were not allowed on Hacker News. I'm not paying for every little news site I read on here (or the big ones). I usually click on the link, realize it's got this crap on it, and bail back out. I don't want to read it and would rather it didn't even show up. For a while I had updated my CSS setup so that these sites would have a strike through on them and I'd go strait to the comments instead of trying to read the story.

dang 7y ago
If there's a workaround, it's ok. Users usually post workarounds in the thread. This is in the FAQ at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html and there's more explanation here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989 and https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix&page=0&query=by:dang%20paywall https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme... The Information doesn't have a workaround, but they do unlock many articles for HN readers. I asked them to unlock this one and they did, so everyone who clicks on it from HN can read it now.