Hacker News Reader

Multiple news orgs have stated in public that they don't care about paywalls bypassers because they put up the paywall to convert only the most amenable readers. This is very similar to the paper distribution model where an extreme minority of subscribers represented the majority of revenue, due to extreme discounts and other subsidies given to most readers.

View on HN

That's true, but it's also on the assumption that the paywall adds just enough friction and reminds readers "you know, if you like this, eventually you might think about paying for it." Some will. Some won't.

Automating the process by pretending to be Google means the user won't even see that friction or messaging. It's clever, but it breaks the premise.

The friction is installing the addon.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com