Being forced to accept _all_ cookies unless I pay : assholedesign

[–] [email protected] 101 points 3 months ago (5 children)

That has to be a GDPR violation, right?

[–] [email protected] 24 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I think this is only in UK

[–] [email protected] 37 points 3 months ago

Ah, right, the joys of Brexit...

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 months ago

I've seen this recently at German newspaper websites too.

[–] steuls 4 points 3 months ago

Most likely ePrivacy rather than GDPR although in most discussions they become the same thing

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

For what?

[–] [email protected] 46 points 3 months ago

Privacy - it's your choice

You know, just choose to afford privacy.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Let us track you to view this article.

or....

Pay us with a trackable payment method to view this article.

Catch-22 Surveillance Economy

I'd rather they put a webasm crypto miner on the page and say "mine for 10s to view this article" or something

[+] [email protected] -10 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Is it really so hard to buy a disposable visa or MasterCard? Can even pay bums to buy them for you.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 3 months ago (1 children)

its friction, a really really high amount of friction.....

Not to mention many of the subscription sites (like newspapers) WILL NOT ACCEPT a prepaid card, or a virtual card - they flat refuse them. It has to be a card they can auto-bill forever. Not everyone does this, but enough do that its really rather bothersome friction.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Seems strange to refuse payments but Im sure there is some accounting person who's figured it out.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

The people they lose from not accepting pre-paid and virtual credit cards costs them less money then the people who forget they signed up for a auto-renewing subscription and pay for months/years without realizing it.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 3 months ago (2 children)

This is why I use a script blocker to block the scripts from marketing domains. From what I have been able to see the cookies aren't written because the code that writes it is not allowed to execute. It also stops script injections and other malware payloads that require extra-domain linkages to scripts.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Firefox + uBlock Origin + Privacy Badger, and happily click on yes to cookies and shit

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

+ pihole and throw in noscript if you're extra paranoid

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

As much as I like no script, last time I tried it. It broke like 75% of the websites.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

I hace been using noscript for like 15 years now. In my experience, it comes down to recognizing what is a required and superfluous or privacy invading 3rd party. Some websites can take me a while to get working, but I have had very few which I cannot figure out.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

I used to love the print Indy. It was a fantastic paper, and the Sunday edition was genuinely a great read in itself with brilliant contributors.

Ever since the print edition ceased (some may point to the launch of i as the turning point but I'm not entirely sure that's fair) the entire operation has been turned into an ad farm masquerading as a news site.

It's a cross between a tabloid and the Million Dollar Homepage nowadays, and what a shame that is. At least it keeps browser "close tab" UI devs in business mind.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 months ago

Loads of them are doing this now, I’m pretty sure it’s illegal.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago

Whatever you do, don't post a link to that article to Archive.ph!

Seriously, it harms rich people by not letting them sell your data.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago

Wasn't Meta doing this exact thing just found to be illegal

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago

Ive seen so many sites that just straight up wont work if you dont accept all cookies. You get the "tracking free" version of the site which is literally nothing. Or they say ok, just make an account and you can reject cookies. Fuck that

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

very aptly named newspaper. one upon which i'll refrain from depending.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

What if there was a way to offer ads while not being extremely privacy invasive? Oh, good thing Mozilla's been working on that! Oh wait, the same people here hate that as well…

Shouldn't news agencies be paid in some way?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago

News agencies have always been able to offer adverts. But with the option to deny optional tracking cookies. Now you have to accept tracking cookies or pay money.

[+] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

[deleted]

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Honest journalism is only for people with a Venezuelan's monthly salary. Very honest.

[+] [email protected] -7 points 3 months ago (2 children)

A normal amount of adverts I think are fair though. Asking to get the content, not paying anything for it, and refusing to watch adverts is just a bit too cheeky, in my opinion.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

No. Most other sites allow you to refuse personalised tracking cookies which doesn’t stop advertising in general but stops targeted ads and tracking cookies

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

They only need to serve ads related to the conent. Because that is most likely something im interested in as I'm visiting the page for that. They don't need any permissions/cookies for that.

[+] [email protected] -9 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I don't see what's the issue.

They want to get paid in some way and they offer the reader the option: pay with your privacy or pay with your money?

Or feel free to close the tab if both options are unacceptable. There are a lot of spamblogs written by chatgpt that allow to read the regurgitated content without accepting cookies, for example.

Maybe it's infuriating because if you really want to read the content you're forced to waste 1 second to right click => open in incognito window or waste 1 minute to sign up for a subscription, but I don't think it's asshole design, because they have to pay bills. You don't want sponsored news pieces and fake reviews in that website either, no?

Now if it was like Facebook where the option is "pay with your privacy or pay with your privacy AND with your money", that would be asshole design

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Yeah it's this or track you anyway like most others

[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Social media ≠ news though. Giants like Facebook can suffer imo

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

Facebook tracking pixel? Google analytics adsense tracking?

It’s not about first party website cookies. Its third parties from over 100 other ad companies

[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Opening in incognito doesnt give you any privacy, they still going to match you using IP and browser fingerprint to get (almost) the same person matching as allowing all cookies.

Cookies just makes it easier.

For me if its a page I opened first time I will just close it and open next search result.

If this page/domain is something I see quite often then depending on the price I might pay.

Paying full monthly price for single page visit is stupid they will have a hard time to convince me to pay. And paying with privacy is out for me.

Waiting for time when they start using centralized payment system that will allow me to pay small amount per visit, like lightning or BAT.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 months ago (1 children)

But at that point is paranoia. If you're worried about tracking via IP address, then there are no websites that you can visit. You can count on a single hand the websites that do no logging whatsoever. Even if you reject cookies, the IP address is always visible server side. Better to sell all your devices and go back living completely offline like in the 80s.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Not true, I'm just fighting the myth that incognito mode gives you (any) privacy.

Company have many legal reasons to store my IP and they do so, don't have a problem with it, but they can't use it legally for advertising without consent. You are agreeing to tracking, that in turn allow them to use your IP for tracking, it doesnt matter if its in incognito mode as now they can track you legally also outside. So your comment about using incognito is just plain wrong.

Ultimatily it's about the rules (including gdpr), I don't agree/approve to be tracked and don't want my visit to be linked to me, so if the website like that don't want to provide content in exchange for ads (like in the OP case above) then they don't need to.

I fully know they can (and probably doing it without asking because they can) track my activity to serve targeted ads. I just voice my disgust and voice my disapproval with the state the advertising is now, and propose a solution that I personally am fine with it.

Why do you think I'm using adblock and pi-hole for?

AssholeDesign