
Ask HN: Is there a way to filter HN to hide articles behind paywalls? - jwr
Recently a large percentage of articles linked to by HN is hidden behind paywalls. The experience is that you click, get a preview, and get slammed with a popup asking for a subscription. The number of such articles has been growing recently, to the point where browsing HN becomes unpleasant.<p>I realize that it is HN policy to allow such postings. I do not agree with it, as I think HN as a link site should be limited to the open web. But if that policy is here to stay, is there a way to automatically filter out articles that are not open-web? A browser plugin? Perhaps HN should introduce a consistent tagging scheme?<p>I am not against paying for media. I already pay for a subscription to The Economist. But I will not additionally buy subscriptions to the New York Times, Washington Post, The New Yorker and countless others. And while I respect the need for these media to make money, I do think that if they are to profit from free and open link aggregation sites like HN, it should be in a manner that is compatible with the open Web. As an example, make some articles viewable without a subscription.<p>I think a solution will need to be worked out, because HN is losing out: a link site with a bunch of links that point to nothing is not very interesting. But as an interim solution, perhaps there are ways for individual HN users to filter out paywalled articles from known paywall sites?
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thedevindevops
Remember to turn off third-party cookies and javascript for all news sites -
why they need either of those is beyond me.

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dang
HN's policy is to allow paywalled articles if and only if there is a standard
workaround for the paywall, such as opening an incognito window. In other
words, articles that everyone can read, at the cost of the annoyance of
jumping through an extra hoop or two.

I'd be curious what articles you're seeing that _don 't_ have such a
workaround and yet are remaining on the front page.

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ChrisGranger
I use some CSS to alert me to paywalls, but I don't filter them out entirely.
Sometimes you can find an alternate version of the article using HN's web
link. A lot of sites with paywalls offer _x_ number of free articles before
the wall shows up, too, so it varies...

Also, content filter add-ons like uBlock Origin often get around paywalls.
YMMV

I posted this CSS last time paywalls were discussed:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19944781](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19944781)

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Sagacious_me
Hopefully this might help you: you can use outline.com to read the paywalled
articles. I've only found like one website for which it doesn't work.

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ChrisGranger
Do you remember which site? I've found it doesn't work for Wall Street
Journal, or for New Scientist.

