The phenomenon of online platforms gradually degrading the quality of their services, often by promoting advertisements and sponsored content, in order to increase profits. (Cory Doctorow, 2022, extracted from Wikitionary) source
We discuss how predatory big tech platforms live and die by luring people in and then decaying for profit.
We also discuss how naturally open technologies like the Fediverse can be susceptible to corporate takeovers, rugpulls and subsequent enshittification.
I'm not going to deal with this, unsubscribing. I recommend everyone else to do the same, we can't let them get away with this. You can instead donate to an actually good news source, such as ProPublica. And nyt has a bunch of controversies, listed here. I can't support this with a clear conscience.
The New York Times has literally had ads on paid subscriptions... forever. Like literally hundreds of years.
What if I told you subscription based newspapers have always had ads
Max and Me
A similar thing happened to me recently with Max. I decided to treat myself and my family with the highest cost plan that had 4k quality, 4 (I think) simultaneous streams, and no ads.
A week into the subscription, we started getting random sports ads in the middle of our content. After an abnormally long discussion with their support folks because they didn't understand that I wasn't talking about the ads that show up BEFORE the content and that in fact I was talking about ads that interrupt the content in the middle of a show or movie, they asked that I send them video evidence, which I did.
Their response? Those aren't ads, those are previews for their other content.
So yeah, seems like a common theme here. These companies are scam artists and liars.
They never corrected their bs claims about murdered babies and systematic rape on Oct 7. Neither of these is true. Mouthpiece for zionist propaganda. That's when I lost all trust in them.
I still have a subscription, which I recalled when I was forced to sign in to read an article last night. Now, I'm putting some thought into whether the balance of bullshit vs information has tipped too much.
The ads don't get me because of multiple ad-blockers, but I agree that paying for an online sub should nullify them. It's not like it costs anything to publish on the web vs printing an actual paper. Sure, servers and bandwidth, but for one article to a person paying for a subscription? Unjustifiable to me. Fuck capitalism. It's destroy[ing/ed] everything.
https://press.un.org/en/2024/sc15621.doc.htm
Do you have a source that refutes this.
Sure, if you want me to do your homework for you, listen to all the episodes of these podcasts since Oct 7: Chapo Traphouse, TrueAnon, Bad Faith.
Wait, you surely don't have time to do that. Let me provide a similar UN finding, to be in kind with yours:
In May 22 the Associated Press published a report detailing two false accounts of sexual and gender-based violence on October 7.[139] One of the accounts was given by Yossi Landau, a longtime volunteer for the ultra-orthodox ZAKA paramedic and rescue group. Landau claimed that as he was working in Kibbutz Be'eri, he found a pregnant woman lying on the floor with her fetus stil attached to the umbilicated cord and removed from her body.[139] The AP reports that Landau then "went on to tell the story to journalists and was cited in outlets around the world."[139] ZAKA spokesperson Moti Bukjin said it took some time before they realized Landau's account was not true, and they told him to stop repeating it, however he continued to do so as he remains convinced it is true. The United Nations also confirmed Landau's account is false.[139] Along with other first responders, Landau also told journalists he had seen beheaded children and babies. However, the AP notes that "No convincing evidence had been publicized to back up that claim, and it was debunked by Haaretz and other major media outlets."[139]
I'm not suggesting that there was no sexual violence. I'm stating that the NYT ran bullshit stories and didn't retract them.
Ok so because two incidents of the hundreds of accounts are not true means that all of the claims are untrue? The UN special envoy mentions substantially more than two.
Podcasts are trash resources for things like this as too many are not actually run by real experts on the subject at hand. The three you list are no exception.
You are engaging in rape denialism because you don’t like Israel or Palestine and that’s messed up. The report I link documents SA in both nations in this war.
Imagine paying for this shite, even without ads.
100% agree
Weren't you subscribed until recently?
I was
Then I think you missed the point of my orginal comment.
So your original point was just to be an asshole to someone who just dropped s service your bagging on?
No, my point was "why would you spend $25 a month on this" with or without ads
It's been like that on The Athletic ever since they got bought out by NYT. If they didn't knock the price of my annual sub down to $20 when I went to cancel it, I'd already have gotten rid of it. After this discount year though, I'm done.
Silly rabbit, did you think paying for a subscription would protect from advertising forever?
I am old enough to remember when cable TV was sold to the masses on the premise that if we bought cable, we wouldn't have to see commercials, since our subscriptions would pay for the service.
It's a ratchet system; annoy you, convince you to pay to make the annoyance go away, then wait a while and introduce another annoyance.. and convince you to pay somre more on top of that to get rid of that annoyance... rinse, repeat.
Take to the seas, my lad (or lassie). yarrrrr.
Lassie :3
What are some good paywall blockers btw? 12ft.io doesn't seem to work with nyt.
I've been using archive.ph with good results
Yeah 12ft.io had to block the NYT because the NYT threatened them I think
12ft.io did an OG AdBlock and told NYT that they'll disable the site for them if they paid up.
I use firefox with adblock and some kind of paywall blocker. Never get ads and no problem reading nyt.
some kind of paywall blocker.
Like no script?
Bypass paywalls clean is the name, it doesnt work on everuthing but i have no problem with the nyt. There are a million firefox addons, i get mine from internet comments. I recommend ublacklist which lets you block websites from google search results, eg no more facebook, twitter, instagram.
Thank you
i get mine from internet comments
Me too, way too many addons to go thru myself. I just use FF + UBO atm, stopped with no script as it started to do some weird things after I had used it for a year or 2
They do do weird things, but i went through 13 years of reddit and youtube with no adds at all so i think the weirdness is cool lol, i remember when evetyone stopped using firefox and i just never left, no ads, no worries lmao, meanwhile reddit was screaming about adds and everyone had to have chrome, i never got it.8
This one seems to work well... at least for nyt.
https://www.removepaywall.com/
Honestly I just wait for other sources without paywalls if I hit one to avoid giving them any clicks :)
Take to the seas
How do you apply this in the context of news articles?
Bypassing adblockers, paywalls etc. are often called 'theft' by mainstream media and their corporate owners. So adblockers (such as uBlock Origin) and similar methods, by the media owners' own definitions, can be considered piracy though that definition should be disputed as merely viewing a web page doesn't deny it from others.
The NYT has been silencing columnists too critical of Trump https://contrarian.substack.com/p/departing-the-new-york-times
Time to unsubscribe.
That condo is pretty ugly anyways. Just a lot of big windows (which make the house super hot in summer and cold in winter) and sad beige.