What does the NYT use to prevent "some" freeware browsers from reading too many of their articles for free?

On 2020-06-26, Mayayana wrote:
"123456789" wrote

| Downloading copyrighted material that was posted illegally is an
| entirely different matter. That's a crime. But reading the NYT is
| exactly how the Internet was designed to work. If they don't want
| you to see it then it's up to them to not make it public.
|
| Couple of examples:
|
| 1) Amazon allows you to read a free sample of their ebooks. The
| sample quits after a designated number of pages. Amazon does so to
| entice you buy the ebook. But you figure out a way to download the ebook
| for free.
|
| 2) The NYT allows you to read a free sample of their newspaper.
| The sample quits after a designated number of pages. NYT does so to
| entice you to buy a newspaper subscription. But you figure out a way to
| download the newspaper (subscription) for free.
|
| Which of the above is a theft?

Those are not comparable. If you manage to find the whole
ebook you're downloading an illegal copy that Amazon did not
put online.

False, it's not necessarily illegal. eg: this work has been out of
copyright forever https://www.amazon.com/B/dp/B088HCCFX9/


--
Jasen.

On 2020-06-26, Alan Baker wrote:
On 2020-06-25 10:23 p.m., Jasen Betts wrote:
On 2020-06-25, Alan Baker wrote:


To Alan Baker, the "buy one get one free" model is "stealing" one jug of milk!
o He's literally _that_ stupid.

Ummmmmm.... ....no.

The NYT is not offering a "buy one get one free" model.

They are offering to show you a small number of articles for free each
period (month, IIRC); after which you are expected to subscribe if you
want more.

You want to subvert the process and get content for free that you are
not entitled to received.

That's theft.

No it's not, I have not deprived them of the article.

And copying a book doesn't deprive the original publisher of it.

probaly not even fraud, as there's no material loss.
Furthermore nowhere am I required to limit the number
of free articles I read.

The NY Times places a limit on that.

It seems to be some number per web browser profile. I have 5 computers
and each has at least two web browser profiles.

The more free artiles I read the more times I see their subscription
advert, and theoretically the more likely I am to eventiually subscribe.

That seems to be the way the like it, if they wanted to they could use
some scarse resource to identify me like a facebook id, but seeing
facebook needed to access NYT I would probably just leave.

--
Jasen.

"Jasen Betts" wrote

| Those are not comparable. If you manage to find the whole
| ebook you're downloading an illegal copy that Amazon did not
| put online.
|
| False, it's not necessarily illegal. eg: this work has been out of
| copyright forever https://www.amazon.com/B/dp/B088HCCFX9/
|

OK. The Bible is out of copyright. I have a TXT
copy myself. I was talking about the idea of getting
copyrighted material that is not being offered for free.
Such things may be available on pirate sites or such.
Those are illegal. Loading a publicly avaiable webpage
in a browser does not involve getting anything that
wasn't offered. So they're two different things.

On Sat, 27 Jun 2020 00:06:55 -0000 (UTC), Jasen Betts wrote:

It seems to be some number per web browser profile.

It's a lot more diverse than that (e.g., social media references don't
count against the free numbers), which simply proves you never read the
references, which described, in detail, the various algorithms the NYT uses
simultaneously to create a leaky paywall on purpose.

Particularly since these were discussed _months_ ago, as that was the
original topic of the original thread before Alan Baker played his always
childish games, always proving his IQ of about 40 or 50 (my estimate).
--
There are only two types of people on Usenet: Morons like Alan Baker, with
an indicated IQ of about 40 or 50, and those who post actual facts.

On 2020-06-27, Arlen Holder wrote:
On Sat, 27 Jun 2020 00:06:55 -0000 (UTC), Jasen Betts wrote:

It seems to be some number per web browser profile.

It's a lot more diverse than that

nevetheless the count or measure is tied to the browser profile, not
to anything connected directly to me.

--
Jasen.

On Sat, 27 Jun 2020 02:25:40 -0000 (UTC), Jasen Betts wrote:

nevetheless the count or measure is tied to the browser profile, not
to anything connected directly to me.

That's an adult observation, which I appreciate, since it irks me that so
many ignorant morons exist in such huge numbers on this thread whose brains
work off of pure intuition and zero actual facts.

At least you're trying to be logical, which is appreciated, instead of
claiming, as Alan Baker apparently did, that eating more than one of the
free samples at Costco (in effect) is stealing.

Since this thread started asking about the NYT paywall leaky back doors,
we've learned the algorithm that the NYT uses to allow their paywall to
leak has changed over time.

For example, this article comes up first in a search of the NYT paywall:
o The Leaky New York Times Paywall & How Google Limits Led To Search Engine Limits
https://searchengineland.com/leaky-new-york-times-paywall-google-limits-69302

But it's from 2011, where it asked then:
"How did we go from the New York Times seeming to single out visitors
from Google with a 5 free visit per day policy to supposedly all search
engines being limited in such a way? And what's up with there being no
limit for visitors coming from anything that's not a search engine,
including Twitter"

Prior to that, the NYT publicly stated, according to that article:
"Readers increasingly find news through search, as well as through
social networks, blogs and other online sources."

Which, of course, is why they allow those avenues greater page hits, as
they lose revenue when people do NOT land on their NYT web site:
"by cutting off its content, the NYT also cut itself off from
advertising pageviews."

Notice the NYT has iterated their paywall and leakwall strategies:
"All visitors to NYTimes.com will have full access to the home page.
In addition, readers will be able to read individual articles through
search sites like Google, Yahoo and Bing without charge. After that
first article, though, clicking on subsequent ones will count toward
the monthly limit."

But the leakwall kept changing:
"initially ALL articles you came to from Google had to be free.
Then it was modified in December 2009 so that there could be a
five visits per day limit."

And then, after a year of study (their second year of studying it):
"Beginning March 28 2011, visitors to NYTimes.com will be able to read
20 articles a month without paying¡K"

But even that wasn't as simple as it may, at first appear to be:
"Not all visits to NYTimes.com will count toward the 20-article limit.
In an effort to reduce losses among the Web site's more than 30 million
monthly readers, The Times will allow access to people who arrive at its
Web site through search engines like Google and social networking sites
like Facebook and Twitter. There will, however, be a five-article limit
a day for people who visit the site from Google."

Here's an interview at that time between Peter Kafka and the NYT:

Peter Kafka: Just to be clear, when the Times says non-subscribers can read
stories above their 20-per-month limit if they come from referring links,
you¡¦re not just talking about Twitter and Facebook, but any link from any
site, right?

Martin Nisenholtz of the NYT: That¡¦s correct.

Kafka: It could be the Journal. It could be a blog, it could be the
Financial Times, anything on the Web, right?

Nisenholtz of the NYT: Yes. The only other thing is that Google has a
methodology where they can limit the number of inbound links per day, and
we intend to take them up on it.

Kafka: So that¡¦s Google doing the actual gating, not you?

Nisenholtz of the NYT: Right. They had made this feature available prior to
us going pay, so it¡¦s not like it was inspired by us per se. We¡¦re just
taking advantage of it.

Of course, that opens up the leakwall:
"More important, it's not just people coming from social media sites that
are allowed in for free. It's people coming from ANY link. ANY LINK!
Want to read a New York Times article? Tweet it to yourself and click on
it. Blog it. Whatever. If it's a link on a page, you¡¦re in, no limits.

Later on, it changed, again:
"the New York Times now says all major search engines will face a
five visits per day limit:"
--
They design in the leakwall and back doors on purpose as their advertising
revenue is greater than their subscription revenue.

On Sat, 27 Jun 2020 04:03:11 -0000 (UTC), Arlen Holder wrote:

They design in the leakwall and back doors on purpose as their advertising
revenue is greater than their subscription revenue.

Here's a more recent article, this one from 2016, describing the
algorithmic changes to the leakwall that the NYT is struggling to design to
allow casual readers to generate ad revenue and whales to generate
subscription revenue.
o The New York Times May Make It Harder to Use Facebook and Twitter to Jump Its Paywall
https://www.vox.com/2016/3/28/11587326/the-new-york-times-may-make-it-harder-to-use-facebook-and-twitter-to

Here it drops from 20 to 10:
"Two months ago, the Times began capping some Facebook users' access to
the site at 10 articles a month, said NYT rep Eileen Murphy. On Friday,
she said, the NYT expanded the test limits to referrals from Twitter
and other services."

Notice they _need_ their paywall to be leaky, on purpose:
"The notion behind the leaky paywall was obvious ¡X the NYT was hoping that
the social networks would help expose the paper to people who didn't see
it very often."
--
Notice they are struggling to balance the whales with the casual readers.