2 ms·

Aren't these just proxies? Wouldn't a VPN give you same protection?

• adg001 5y ago
  Not quite so. You have to account for javascript support or lack thereof, cookies, and other tracking techniques employed by popular services and generally absent on these frontends. VPN by themselves will only "hide" your IP address.
  • beauHD 5y ago
    Also: some services deliberately hide behind a login prompt, like Quora. It's impossible to read quora answers without logging in. Same with other walled gardens like LinkedIN and Facebook.
    • worg 5y ago
      you can read quora answers anonymously by adding `share=1` as query param
• 3np 5y ago
  Apart from what others mentioned, other benefits include significantly reduced resource usage on the client due to only including the CSS and JS necessary to give a good user experience, without needing to configure adblockers etc on every client. You can also do funky stuff like tunnel different sites through different tunnels and share instances with other people.
• roywiggins 5y ago
  I switched to Nitter after Twitter started demanding you be logged in to even click on a profile from a tweet.