this post was submitted on 27 Oct 2023
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Privacy

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Yeah 12ft doenst seem to work on any sites anymore. Does anyone have any alternatives that work? I'm already familiar with the airplane mode trick but that's not always fit for purpose.

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[–] [email protected] 57 points 1 year ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

I use this on Firefox Mobile and desktop and it works great

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

This is the way. They also have adblock lists you can add directly to ublock/adguard

[–] [email protected] 54 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Time to dig out that 14ft ladder

[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I just copy the link to archive.org and read the archived page

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago

So this doesn't work for wallstreet Journal pages unfortunately but does work for Natgeo! Thank you!

[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (4 children)

is there a difference between .ph and .is?

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 year ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago

That's one short ladder.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

Bump for justice, ty

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Try turning off JavaScript when ur faced with an overlaying paywall

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Yeah, I haven't seen a paywall in years with javascript disabled by default.

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 year ago

Some websites circumvent this by only having one paragraph of the story loaded if you turn off JavaScript.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Try the serious properties, like Economist or FT. Their paywalls are hard.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

The economist is a bad example lol.

Their site loads the content before it locks it down. So you can just reload the side and press reading mode before it removes it again.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I’m going to get fired at for saying this, but websites like that are why I keep Brave around as a last resort news backup. Its reader mode didn’t get past FT, but easily did so for the Economist.

(I don’t need education about Brave, but readers can lodge their complaints and do the token rants right here 👇)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Thanks, I’m aware, but afaik that is not an option on iOS mobile.

edit: just looked again and saw the brief blurb for iOS/iPadOS, will look into it further

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Lots of sites just dont load anything w JS disabled. Nytimes for example

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Add this to your custom filter list.

Bypass Paywalls Clean filter. Works for me with local papers and others like NYTimes etc.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Do I add this to my Pi-hole?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Eh, no.. I meant in the settings in uBlock Origin, which you would already have installed as an addon in your browser of choice. Choose open dashboard, it opens at filter lists and down the bottom is 'Import', just below 'Custom'. Add the url to import, it'll do its thing and you'll have a new entry in 'Custom'. Sorry, don't know much about Pi-Holes.

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

Oh right! Already use Ublock will give this a go.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

No prob! Coupled with zero ads, it's like it used to be back in the day, just.. well, an article with some images. Good luck!

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (5 children)

The archive sites work great, even for WSJ articles. I just checked after I saw your comment saying archive.ph doesn't work for WSJ articles, and it works fine for archiving WSJ articles.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Simple filterlists, by definition, only work for a short time. Maybe a specific userscript can help. There are also Extensions, which redirect to articles about the same content to sites without paywall, like Unpaywall do, which is maybe the best option.

In Firefox, to use userscripts, you need to install first an Userscript Manage, like Tampermonkey, Violentmonkey, etc. which you find in the Mozilla Store. In Vivaldi it isn't needed, simply download the script to a folder (don't delete it) and drag it to the Extension Page in Developer mode in the Browser, to install it directly as an extension.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (3 children)

12ft.io is a website that allows you to bypass paywalls on websites. Specifically for articles/news. The idea being “show me a 10ft wall and I’ll build a 12ft ladder.” It worked well against a lot of article and news outlet paywalls originally, but as time has gone on more and more sites are starting to show up on it as unable to bypass.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So what you're saying is that we need 13ft.io

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (3 children)

12ft1in.io

Go as small as possible so that our ladder only has to get slightly longer. Plus I’m petty.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I just went to 12ft.io and got the following message:

This Deployment has been disabled.

Your connection is working correctly.

Vercel is working correctly.

So I'm guessing the site is gone?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Ah got it, thanks.

The great enshittification continues.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

How is it enshittification to stop people from pirating your stuff?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

These websites generally only work due to poor website coding. If they properly implemented a paywall, sites like Archive and 12ft would never work because you would actually need to pay for access.

Sites like Archive still seem to work, while 12ft returns empty pages.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I wouldn't really consider improving their website coding so that people can't pirate it enshittification.

Enshittification is based around a platform first creating something good for users and then making it good for suppliers and then when they are locked in, reduce quality. You aren't locked into a news website that you aren't even paying for, and you aren't entitled to their products either.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's not the issue I am describing. Instead of improving their website code so people cannot pirate it, it seems like they are specifically blocking 12ft. Other workarounds still work.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

How is specifically blocking 12ft enshittification then.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

On the one hand, you're absolutely right.

On the other hand "The truth is paywalled, but the lies are free."

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

I saw this advice on an IG post (https://www.instagram.com/reel/CxBpKwrSblD/?igshid=MTc4MmM1YmI2Ng==).

This is for a desktop computer. I'm adding in the brackets what I believe are the actions they are taking in the IG video if you don't want to click the link:

"If you're on a website that's forcing you to log in, [right click over the article and select] Inspect Elements, highlight over [the page and select] Delete [and then select] Node."

I have not tried this myself. If you have clearer directions please reply to this comment!

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

This works for some sites, but honestly it's easier using the Firefox reading mode on those sites, it basically does the same thing. It only works if the page loads the full articles text behind the pay wall popup which unfortunately not many do.

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