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A real shame. Even if you put all the political arguments aside it sucks when a site requires you to log in before you can read content on it. For me that’ll m
by afavour 1mo ago
A real shame. Even if you put all the political arguments aside it sucks when a site requires you to log in before you can read content on it.
For me that’ll mean I just don’t read content on there any more. Which I realise X doesn’t care about, I’m not monetisable anyway. But a shame nonetheless.
- GoblinSlayer 1mo agoIt's builtin adblocker, hehe, internet was full of shit for a while anyway. Books are the new internet.
- snottynose 1mo agoHear, hear.
- Arubis 1mo agoIndeed. I’d only reengaged with any Xitter content when I realized I could get it through xcancel. Without a door like this, it’s invisible to me.
- xp84 1mo ago[flagged]
- seattle_spring 1mo agoNot really. More like the modern equivalent of "I don't watch Fox News."
- deleted 1mo ago[deleted]
- culi 1mo agoOver 85% of the US is not on twitter. It's not at all comparable to television.
- hedora 1mo agoOnly 36% pays for cable TV. Seems pretty comparable to me. https://www.cablecompare.com/blog/us-cable-subscriber-statistics https://www.cablecompare.com/blog/us-cable-subscriber-statis...
- Catloafdev 1mo agoThat's a higher percentage of the population than those who voted for the winning candidate in the last presidential election. I wouldn't say that's comparable to ~15%.
- vel0city 1mo agoThere's a pretty radical difference between the statements "I don't have cable" and "I don't even own a TV". I know lots of people who spend an immensely unhealthy amount of time in front of TVs (even me from time to time, not judging), and few of them have a cable subscription.
- numpad0 1mo agoOver 60% uses Twitter in Japan, behind only to LINE and YouTube. Also comparable if English was not language of business.
- culi 1mo agoIf anyone's curious, 98.4% of US households had television in the mid 90s (most likely the peak). In 1960 it was 90%.
- bigstrat2003 1mo agoAnd I would wager that the numbers are still very similar. One doesn't need to pay for cable TV to watch TV these days.
- afavour 1mo agoSurely not. Twitter is a niche social networking site. It’s something like 1/6 the active user base of Facebook, which would be the better comparison.
- happytoexplain 1mo agoNot even close. Any given social network is not ubiquitous, socially.
- nozzlegear 1mo agoThis seems really out of touch tbh.
- Waterluvian 1mo agoReddit is the worst for this. I hate the disgusting, low class UX design where they let you read about 10-15 seconds of a page before locking you out. Though I think Pinterest takes the cake for being just the ugliest example of this.
- alex1138 1mo agospez is a problem. And if it's not spez, then enlighten me. But they've taken years of built up network effects and absolutely wrecked it. It's so hostile when companies do this. They just ignore their users, straight up. That should be a firable offense. The customer is NOT 'always right', but you can meet them halfway Fail upwards. That's all they know how to do
- afavour 1mo ago> They just ignore their users, straight up. Existing Reddit users aren’t affected by this regi wall UX because they’re already logged in. And as much as I hate the UX too… Reddit user numbers have grown a ton in the last few years. It’s difficult to make the argument that these changes are a failure.
- nerdsniper 1mo agoPeople who aren’t logged in are still (very arguably) users, IMHO. They see ads, and make Reddit money with their eyeballs.
- trompetenaccoun 1mo agoWhat kind of users though? OnlyFans models, porn addicts, LLMs and child groomers... maybe. I could be ignorant because I'm not the target user for their brave new vision but no one I know uses reddit anymore. And with the locking of old.reddit and forcing sign-ups they probably lost the last few old timers who were still there for what was supposed to be an open forum to freely exchange ideas.
- throw0101a 1mo ago> Existing Reddit users aren’t affected by this regi wall UX because they’re already logged in. I am an existing Reddit user, but don't want to be logged in everywhere and always. Sometimes I had a few free moments and wanted to kill some time, so until recently I could go to Old Reddit on my mobile phone and just see what the 'general human zeitgeist' was discussing: from something serious in /r/worldnews to some pop culture news story.
- UltraSane 1mo agoSites that force you to login to actually use it feel very arrogant.
- gnuplustoejam 1mo agoNice to see everyone taking a break from their day jobs at Google of continually breaking yt-dlp so it's impossible to use, to comment how this is an injustice. To the aggrieved I say: 403 Forbidden. In their defense, you're not getting the full YouTube experience without ads of an AI doctor selling you suppositories.
- afavour 1mo agoThis might be the first HN thread I’ve seen where the statement “regiwalled content is bad” is somehow attracting a lot of negative reactions…
- miloignis 1mo agoThere's a bit difference between breaking a scraper and sending Cease and Desist letters. Also, blocking scraping is very rich (and expectedly hypocritical) for an AI company, which SpaceX is now.
- notpushkin 1mo agoGoogle has sent a cease and desist letter to youtube-dl. It didn’t work out well. And of course, Google is an AI company, too.
- account42 1mo agoWasn't it a DMCA takedown actually?
- notpushkin 1mo agoThere are probably some legal differences (IANAL), but isn’t the idea basically the same as in C&D?
- gamer191 1mo agoIt was the RIAA, not Google It failed because it didn’t make any technical sense. The RIAA was trying to argue that YouTube’s proof-of-work JavaScript challenges were some kind of DRM and by running JavaScript YouTube-dl was circumventing DRM
- deleted 1mo ago[deleted]
- nomel 1mo ago> when a site requires you to log in before you can read content on it. Where does this come from? You can see the last few posts of an account [1], and the contents of a single posts, but minimal to no comments [2]. Videos play after dismissing the login popup. I have no X account, but I read content there all the time without issue. [1] https://x.com/ID_AA_Carmack https://x.com/ID_AA_Carmack [2] https://x.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/2091983940609245467 https://x.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/2091983940609245467
- mock-possum 1mo agoNot sure how you manage that - twitter, insta, and pinterest all begrudgingly let you see one, maybe two things, then lock down and prevent you from interacting without logging in. It really gives the sense that you’re not wanted there. And so I gladly oblige.
- gruez 1mo agoA few months ago you needed to log in to view any replies, which was critical for some threads.
- ryantgtg 1mo agoI received an Amber Alert a few days ago, which linked to a Twitter post containing the details, and the "x" in the "plz login" modal that blocked the entire screen was non-functional. I just sat there pounding on the x, and then a little hand gif popped up and pointed at the login button.
- andsoitis 1mo ago> a site requires you to log in before you can read content on it. That's not true for X. You can read content without being signed in. https://help.x.com/en/safety-and-security/public-and-protected-posts https://help.x.com/en/safety-and-security/public-and-protect...
- BLKNSLVR 1mo agoNot in any useful way that makes Twitter better or different than other sources of news.
- andsoitis 1mo agoI can't think of another platform that carries a more diverse range of news and perspectives. But that's beside the point. I was pointing out that X does allow non-logged in users view posts.
- untrust 1mo agoText posts, yes. Videos can't be watched with volume on web as any interaction with the video player redirects you to the App Store
- andsoitis 1mo ago> Text posts, yes. Videos can't be watched with volume on web as any interaction with the video player redirects you to the App Store While inconvenient, I would be surprised if isn't a relatively small use case. Most people who use X on their phones are using the app.
- BLKNSLVR 1mo agoWe're probably cross purposes, but, yes, you can view posts in isolation if directly linked to that individual post. But try to go anywhere 'related' or follow a trail of replies and you're blocked by either a login prompt or a post limit or some other guest-unfriendly pattern. And that means, for me personally, that the original 'thing' is not worth the time because I can't follow the train of thought that it creates - which is probably why it's designed that way: annoy people into signing up. I can not and will not reward that (mostly, I'm probably hypocritical in a couple of facets of my life choices).
- apparent 1mo agoIt's possible that the lack of these alternatives will decrease engagement enough that Twitter would loosen these rules. Perhaps not that likely, but it's possible.
- PowerElectronix 1mo agoI'd say that's practically a given. Everyone that wants to have an account already has one, everyone else will not make an account just because they are bothered into making one. Nitter and xcancel traffic must be negligible, they're doing this just to pretend they're doing stuff to justify their legal department wages.
- account42 1mo agoWould be funny if this backfires and results in consequences/restrictions for their own (AI) scraping.
- BLKNSLVR 1mo agoIt goes against the whole “global town square" declaration. Only if you're part of the club. If not, fuck off! I choose to fuck off.
- Melatonic 1mo agoWant to come to the free town square ? Gotta show ID first to the guard at the wall
- make3 1mo ago& the town square forces you to listen to famous gossippers and dumb popular people you've never heard of
- ShinyLeftPad 1mo ago(the guard will also sell you a loudspeaker and an "official" badge for a modest fee)
- ppljudge 1mo agoThis. It bugs me that we can’t read without logging in, and other UX decisions that basically made me quit using it for like 7 or 8 months now.
- koiueo 1mo agoYou should've removed your account too. You won't miss much.
- rbanffy 1mo agoWe all hope the current age of enshitification will eventually end.
- zer0zzz 1mo agoEnshitification doesn’t end. It collapses under its own weight as people get tired and instead stop using things or switch to some newer radically different paradigm.
- KronisLV 1mo ago> switch to some newer radically different paradigm. What if there won’t be a critical mass of fediverse users for it to matter enough and centralised social media platforms are all that we’ll ever get? Asking because things don’t always magically get better, for example phones are still mostly using locked down Android that bends to corporate whims and the alternative phone options are quite limited (how many Linux phones have failed to get mass market adoption?). Ofc not all is grim, like Framework is doing some good work on repairable hardware in general and also in regards to software there are quite a few FOSS projects that respect the user etc., like Mastodon also exists and is actually decent to use. I just think it’s important to acknowledge that the network effects of some of these established players are quite major.
- BoxOfRain 1mo ago> What if there won’t be a critical mass of fediverse users for it to matter enough and centralised social media platforms are all that we’ll ever get? I know this might not be a popular view but I'd be fairly content with a fediverse that never scales to the size of platforms like reddit, a lot of the reasons I use the fediverse is because it resembles older forums or even reddit before it was enormous.
- inigyou 1mo agoYou don't have to comply with a cease and desist notice, depending on your risk tolerance. They're not legally binding, like court orders. Rather, they are threats, equivalent to "gimme your lunch money or I'll beat you up"
- Gud 1mo agoIt depends on how deep your pockets are, not risk tolerance. And the manbaby in charge will absolutely go after you.
- inigyou 1mo agoThat's risk tolerance. You can even choose not to have a lawyer (but you shouldn't) and then it costs you very little until you lose.
- account42 1mo agoYes and hiQ v. LinkedIn has already given us precedent that scraping is not inherently illegal, not to mention X's own scraping to train their AI. Makes sense that they want to consult legal experts rather than just going with their gut though but I hope those legal experts will work something out that gets them back online.
- koe123 1mo agoI hope the EU makes it illegal
- jorisw 1mo agoYes, more regulations from the EU is what the internet needs /s
- PowerElectronix 1mo ago"And the monkey's paw curled a finger"
- holgerschurig 1mo agoUnlikely. The EU is first and foremost a business club. So the majority of EU rules are there to create a common market. If one participant is trying to be dodgy, then oftentimes a rule valid for all market participants is created, to re-establish the common market. Sometimes it's even the producers that ask the EU to regulate it. E.g. all of those classes for vegetables originated from the producers. As a result, an egg of size "M" from Netherlands has the same size as an egg of the size "M" from France. And both can be sold in e.g. Belgium, since we now have a common market and common attributes. A customer seeing an "M" sized egg in the shelves doesn't need to ponder, he knows what he gets. If some website needs a login so that you can view contents is completely outside of this. That is actually common, many newspapers and magazines do that. Its entirely to their discretion if they allow free public access, limited access, or paid access. One doesn't need to be Google Search, one can also be Kagi, so to say.
- koe123 1mo agoImplicitly its payment via data but most people don't understand. Theres an asymmetry in the transaction to me.
- ehnto 1mo agoBoth Imgur and Reddit have put a lot of roadblocks up lately as well. I think some of it is driven by trying to reduce bot traffic. It's quite inconsistent though which is really frustrating. I can look at the imgur homepage feed, but if I go into a specific post and accidentally click anywhere it throws a modal up that can't be dismissed. If I go on a specific subreddit or post I can freely look, but reddit homepage now pops a modal you can't dismiss. This is on mobile browsers, of course both sites are pushing their apps. I am sure it doesn't align with their incentives so they don't care, I will never have an account and never install the app, but why block me from viewing the site if I am still seeing the ads? Does the free ad model just not pay anymore, or is the selling user data model just that much more lucrative that they would rather no user at all if they aren't logged in?
- dyauspitr 1mo agoHide distracting items is great on the iPhone to delete elements on the page intuitively and it remembers what you hid.
- socalgal2 1mo agoImgur is 80% posts of text for people trying to post political messages vs what it used to be, interesting or funny pictures I guess that's their traffic so that's their market but ugh. Imagine if flickr or some other photo site was run over by people posting photos of text messags.
- eterm 1mo agoI discovered recently that a big part of this is that sites weight photos of text higher than text. I learned that the LinkedIn meta of photos of posts is because their algorithm de-ranks anything with a link, so for farming you should post a picture of text then follow up with a link to a blog post a day later as a comment reply to the post to double-dip the activity. And, eurgh, so many bad incentives to just make everything worse. If you earnestly just post a link to a blog, it weights you don't because they don't want people leaving their feed. And actual text people spend less time hovering than photos of text, so again, down the ranking your post goes. I don't spend much time on other social media but if Imgur is all just photos of text that won't be an accident, but it'll be what sites optimise for.
- pbhjpbhj 1mo agoIt interesting because it suggests Musk doesn't need Twitter to swing anymore elections... He didn't buy it [solely] to make money from it.
- kopirgan 1mo agoActually between us and X is not logged in but Xcancel itself I believe logs in. So it's not a login issue..
- snottynose 1mo ago> I just don’t read content on there any more This is the sensible response. I'm always bemused by the reactions that go: "this is a garbage site but I am forced to use it every day". Be grateful that your social media addiction is now automatically mitigated! Go outside!
- jack_pp 1mo agoNot only requires you to log in, asks you your username once you do log in, which means for me I can't log in because I had a random username and there is no email from them where it is mentioned