5 ms·
Meta topic, but it seems kind of rude to link to the print page. The washington post is already a very readable site, If i don't want ads, i'll use adblock.
by swalsh 13y ago
Meta topic, but it seems kind of rude to link to the print page. The washington post is already a very readable site, If i don't want ads, i'll use adblock.
- angersock 13y agohttp://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ perhaps?
- btbuildem 13y agoor Readability
- drcube 13y agoIf you don't want people to view something on the public web, don't post it there. This page design is infinitely better than the other one, also linked on the HN front page. Seems like you get a choice. Hooray for freedom!
- stdbrouw 13y agoHe's saying it's rude (not despicable or forbidden) to link to this page when putting it in front of a big crowd (not e.g. when viewing it on your own). Your comment is therefore entirely beside the point.
- drcube 13y agoIt's rude to link to an ugly site when you could link to a better, more readable one. It's rude to lie and manipulate people for money, when you could easily avoid doing so. Advertising should not be encouraged, ever. When you have the opportunity to show someone an ad-free, single page, uncluttered version of a piece of literature, do it. Please. Always.
- ChristianBundy 13y ago>Advertising should not be encouraged, ever. I've never come across this view – can you tell me why you hold that opinion?
- drcube 13y agoAdvertising is basically all manipulation and lies. If it isn't, we just call it "information". Look at what they call "underwriting" on nonprofit independent or public radio stations. "This production is brought to you by Bill's Shoes, 123 Main Street, Saginaw. Selling Men's and Women's shoes, boots and sandals since 1982." Advertising goes beyond that, using false superlatives, misleading copy, calls to action, and peer pressure, at best. At worst it's just lies. There is nothing free about "buy one get one free", for instance. It's a lie. Sales, "deals", "limited time only" -- these are psychological games. Manipulation. Often, the "everyday" price the sale prices is marked down from, is a lie. Misleading propaganda at best. Straight up fraud at worst. This is the everyday "harmless" content we allow our children and politicians to watch. And that's just traditional television, radio and print advertising. What passes for advertising on the internet is uniformly awful. I'd call most of it malware.
- Wingman4l7 13y ago
- aroch 13y agoWe all know that's not swalsh's point. WaPo is doing us a public service by reporting on all of this, we should encourage such reporting by giving them the ad-revenue from out views.
- sneak 13y agoWhat's rude is pointless pagination and sidebars.
- efuquen 13y agoPointless in what sense? In that the Washington Post needs to make money or that you want quality journalism, no ads, to pay nothing for it, and golden unicorns to ride on? Also, the original page has a single page, no pagination: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-tracking-cellphone-locations-worldwide-snowden-documents-show/2013/12/04/5492873a-5cf2-11e3-bc56-c6ca94801fac_story.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-tr...
- Scriptor 13y agoI'm not sure which plugins you have running, but it definitely splits it into three pages for me.
- BlackDeath3 13y agoThree pages here as well.
- pit 13y agoI humbly disagree. I was waiting for the site to "finish loading", and when I realized that it had, I was delighted.
- swalsh 13y agoMy point is that, journalism is free because they are subsidized by advertisements. If you as an individual want to go directly to the print page... of course that's fine. It's great that you have that option. However, when posting a link on a site that will likely generate hundreds of hits (3% of which might click the ad), its only fair to THE COMPANY to post to their main site.
- foobarqux 13y agoThat doesn't really go far enough: If people don't buy more of the products being advertised as a result of the ad then the advertisers will stop running the ads and WaPo will lose revenue. That's not fair to WaPo. Everyone should promise to buy whatever product is being advertised or at least convince themselves that their brain patterns have been changed so that they are more likely to buy the product in the future. It's only fair to WaPo.
- err4nt 13y agoI dint get how this is rude, it would be trivial for THE COMPANY to add a few lines to their server configuration to redirect all incoming traffic from anywhere (or even just HN or Reddit) to redirect seamlessly to the non-print page that has both the ads and a print button....but this site hasn't done that (yet). I don't think it's really that big of a deal. If it was a subscription service we were all bypassing without paying that's one thing, but this is just another page on their public website like anything else. If you don't want people to see it, don't publish it online.
- dyselon 13y agoI don't know about everyone else, but the print page still has an ad on it for me.