4 ms·

It's so aggravating going to these news sites. It's almost as bad as the days of search bars installed in your browser. I'm not on the biggest screen in the wor

by Pigo 7y ago

It's so aggravating going to these news sites. It's almost as bad as the days of search bars installed in your browser. I'm not on the biggest screen in the world, but I can't even see the title of the article. https://i.imgur.com/UYT7qpN.png https://i.imgur.com/UYT7qpN.png I've been to plenty of other sites just as bad too. It instantly kills my desire find the article and read it.

4AoZqrH2fsk5UB 7y ago
Use ublock origin and invest time in zapping the offending divs for the sites you frequent. Within a few weeks you'll find the internet a much more pleasant place.
- Pigo 7y ago
  I will check that out, don't believe I've heard of it. I can utilize tools like these to make things easier for myself. But this view is what the average new reader experiences, it's surprising that they don't care more about that.
  - 4AoZqrH2fsk5UB 7y ago
    true. also firefox has a "reader mode" that strips everything away... but you have to click to activate. for reference, this[0] is what the above page looked like when I landed on it [0]: https://imgur.com/a/LyeybN2 https://imgur.com/a/LyeybN2
- alasarmas 7y ago
  What's the right way to use UBO to zap divs that have some sort of random identifier appended to prevent zapping? Is there a regex match mode?
  - Lammy 7y ago
    Maybe try a CSS selector based off of the next parent element that does have a permanent identifier? first-child/nth-child and friends can get you a long way.
  - 4AoZqrH2fsk5UB 7y ago
    no good fix here (other than the "nth" approach). Fortunately, most news sites use sensible divs (for now).
- bil7 7y ago
  are there any community div id lists for common annoying elements? I already have all the defaults in UBO enabled.
switchbak 7y ago
The fact that we're seriously talking about having to install plugins and manually munge the HTML of an everyday corporate site just to make it minimally navigable is, in my mind, absolute madness. It really is a return to the bad old days of the late 90's web where one wrong click would kill your browser with 20 new popups. Except this time these corporations are willingly doing it to themselves. I wouldn't have believed it even a few years ago. Surely this must be killing engagement on their sites?
- muglug 7y ago
  The solution is to pay for journalism.
  - LifeLiverTransp 7y ago
    There are many ways to pay for it, either by offering mining cpu power, or money, or bare with me- somebody works really hard to circumvent the drm of any site - and shares the content. Which would be really easy and almost always cheaper if we had the technology to duplicate and spread that decode-work. So we are still waiting for journalism to go bust and get streamed like it happened for music and movies?
  - TallGuyShort 7y ago
    I don't think that's all there is to it. For the first part of last year I started paying for a subscription to several news sites of various scopes. I still got some annoying ads, albeit fewer, but annoying emails and other messages increased because they needed my engagement (because they were STILL selling ads), and my daily reading was still overwhelmingly flooded with click-bait style journalism (again, they need my engagement and that's what they think will engage me).
    - jordanpg 7y ago
      I agree: I think the dirty little secret about advertising supported journalism (or really most websites producing new "content" with some regular frequency) is that much of the "content" is absolutely vapid fast food. I don't know what an internet without all of the worthless ad-supported "content" looks like, but however it looks, suspect it is the steady-state equilibrium that will exist in the future. Because the ad-supported business model -- bad UX by definition -- is so obviously a house of cards.
muglug 7y ago
If more people paid for journalism, sites like The Guardian’s wouldn’t have to have those banners. To turn it around: what journalism have you paid for recently?
- jordanpg 7y ago
  I do not agree that it is my responsibility to help fix The Guardian's business model. Maybe the presence of these banners says something important about the value of the content (in this context) and the respect that the organization has for its readers.
- giarc 7y ago
  I feel like many people are ok with ad supported media, but when you can no longer see the content from all the ads, it gets a bit much.
- Pigo 7y ago
  I actually am willing to pay for journalism, but it becomes a constant research project to find out what source isn't on a biased agenda crusade. Any recommendations on pure journalism source I should check out?
  - muglug 7y ago
    There has never been such a thing as "bias-free" journalism. We all have biases, and so do journalists and their editors. If you're willing to pay for journalism, find a newspaper – any newspaper – and buy a subscription. I assume from your posts that you're in America, and politically right-of-centre. What about the Wall Street Journal? It broke the Theranos story and many others, and employs a raft of very good journalists doing important work.
    - Pigo 7y ago
      The wsj does seem to not cater as much to opinion pieces or clickbait titles. I guess that's what I was asking. I get plenty of opinions and editorials for free these days, I don't want to pay for that even if I agree with them. I miss the outlets that seemed to focus on straight up news. We had a local paper in my area, The Western Star, that ran for 206 years. It was the last source that I was really dedicated to, because I cared a lot more about local. RIP Western Star https://ohiomemory.org/digital/collection/p16007coll84 https://ohiomemory.org/digital/collection/p16007coll84
admax88q 7y ago
Haha that screenshot is amazing, its the perfect reflection of what's bad with modern news sites.
- Pigo 7y ago
  Thanks, I truly didn't know if people really understood how bad it can be for new users. If you go to these sites with blockers and extensions, I'm sure it's fine, so they would think I'm exaggerating. I'm on a new machine from work, so I'm seeing some things from an average user's perspective.
htfu 7y ago
As far as I can tell all this shows is they didn't expect people to use the site in landscape on an 18.5:9 phone while spoofing a desktop user agent. Which is fair enough since pretty much no one does that. I've run into honestly much more bizarre stuff without ever venturing outside portrait... But I assume I'm missing something really obvious.

by Pigo 7y ago

4AoZqrH2fsk5UB 7y ago

Use ublock origin and invest time in zapping the offending divs for the sites you frequent. Within a few weeks you'll find the internet a much more pleasant place.

Pigo 7y ago
I will check that out, don't believe I've heard of it. I can utilize tools like these to make things easier for myself. But this view is what the average new reader experiences, it's surprising that they don't care more about that.
- 4AoZqrH2fsk5UB 7y ago
  true. also firefox has a "reader mode" that strips everything away... but you have to click to activate. for reference, this[0] is what the above page looked like when I landed on it [0]: https://imgur.com/a/LyeybN2 https://imgur.com/a/LyeybN2
alasarmas 7y ago
What's the right way to use UBO to zap divs that have some sort of random identifier appended to prevent zapping? Is there a regex match mode?
- Lammy 7y ago
  Maybe try a CSS selector based off of the next parent element that does have a permanent identifier? first-child/nth-child and friends can get you a long way.
- 4AoZqrH2fsk5UB 7y ago
  no good fix here (other than the "nth" approach). Fortunately, most news sites use sensible divs (for now).
bil7 7y ago
are there any community div id lists for common annoying elements? I already have all the defaults in UBO enabled.

switchbak 7y ago

The fact that we're seriously talking about having to install plugins and manually munge the HTML of an everyday corporate site just to make it minimally navigable is, in my mind, absolute madness. It really is a return to the bad old days of the late 90's web where one wrong click would kill your browser with 20 new popups. Except this time these corporations are willingly doing it to themselves. I wouldn't have believed it even a few years ago. Surely this must be killing engagement on their sites?

muglug 7y ago
The solution is to pay for journalism.
- LifeLiverTransp 7y ago
  There are many ways to pay for it, either by offering mining cpu power, or money, or bare with me- somebody works really hard to circumvent the drm of any site - and shares the content. Which would be really easy and almost always cheaper if we had the technology to duplicate and spread that decode-work. So we are still waiting for journalism to go bust and get streamed like it happened for music and movies?
- TallGuyShort 7y ago
  I don't think that's all there is to it. For the first part of last year I started paying for a subscription to several news sites of various scopes. I still got some annoying ads, albeit fewer, but annoying emails and other messages increased because they needed my engagement (because they were STILL selling ads), and my daily reading was still overwhelmingly flooded with click-bait style journalism (again, they need my engagement and that's what they think will engage me).
  - jordanpg 7y ago
    I agree: I think the dirty little secret about advertising supported journalism (or really most websites producing new "content" with some regular frequency) is that much of the "content" is absolutely vapid fast food. I don't know what an internet without all of the worthless ad-supported "content" looks like, but however it looks, suspect it is the steady-state equilibrium that will exist in the future. Because the ad-supported business model -- bad UX by definition -- is so obviously a house of cards.

muglug 7y ago

If more people paid for journalism, sites like The Guardian’s wouldn’t have to have those banners. To turn it around: what journalism have you paid for recently?

jordanpg 7y ago
I do not agree that it is my responsibility to help fix The Guardian's business model. Maybe the presence of these banners says something important about the value of the content (in this context) and the respect that the organization has for its readers.
giarc 7y ago
I feel like many people are ok with ad supported media, but when you can no longer see the content from all the ads, it gets a bit much.
Pigo 7y ago
I actually am willing to pay for journalism, but it becomes a constant research project to find out what source isn't on a biased agenda crusade. Any recommendations on pure journalism source I should check out?
- muglug 7y ago
  There has never been such a thing as "bias-free" journalism. We all have biases, and so do journalists and their editors. If you're willing to pay for journalism, find a newspaper – any newspaper – and buy a subscription. I assume from your posts that you're in America, and politically right-of-centre. What about the Wall Street Journal? It broke the Theranos story and many others, and employs a raft of very good journalists doing important work.
  - Pigo 7y ago
    The wsj does seem to not cater as much to opinion pieces or clickbait titles. I guess that's what I was asking. I get plenty of opinions and editorials for free these days, I don't want to pay for that even if I agree with them. I miss the outlets that seemed to focus on straight up news. We had a local paper in my area, The Western Star, that ran for 206 years. It was the last source that I was really dedicated to, because I cared a lot more about local. RIP Western Star https://ohiomemory.org/digital/collection/p16007coll84 https://ohiomemory.org/digital/collection/p16007coll84

admax88q 7y ago

Haha that screenshot is amazing, its the perfect reflection of what's bad with modern news sites.

Pigo 7y ago
Thanks, I truly didn't know if people really understood how bad it can be for new users. If you go to these sites with blockers and extensions, I'm sure it's fine, so they would think I'm exaggerating. I'm on a new machine from work, so I'm seeing some things from an average user's perspective.

htfu 7y ago

As far as I can tell all this shows is they didn't expect people to use the site in landscape on an 18.5:9 phone while spoofing a desktop user agent. Which is fair enough since pretty much no one does that. I've run into honestly much more bizarre stuff without ever venturing outside portrait... But I assume I'm missing something really obvious.