
Ask HN: What benefit is there to requiring sign-in before browsing? - coreyp_1
I was just trying to show a student something on aliexpress.com (that I thought would be useful for his project), and the website wouldn&#x27;t let me browse product categories or search without logging in first.<p>I suppose LinkedIn does this, as have several other sites that I&#x27;ve noticed.<p>Why do sites choose this user-hostile approach?<p>In the case of the student that I was trying to show a part to, I just looked the item up on Amazon instead and Aliexpress lost a sale.<p>Go figure?
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elmerfud
Tracking and marketing to select partners. It's easier to know who you are if
you're logged in.

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notlukesky
I have to agree. There is more sales loss to me than user gains. Of course I
don’t have the numbers of these companies at scale. Presumably they did the
math and gain more conversions than losses to continue doing this.

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hitpointdrew
Same bullshit with "Call for pricing".

How about no. How about you be transparent and list the pricing on your page.

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mtmail
It could be a counter-measure to not get crawled by price comparison engines.

