I'm more getting at the facy that this is a link to reading an article Not a link to a who-can-get rid of the popup the best contest We're the people that build these systems and this is about design and usability and when you open a can of cola you would be upset if it were worms because it said cola on the front I wonder how many hours of peoples lives are lost to trying to control the computer to get it to do what it said it was doing on the tin, rather than what is in the interests of the politics or the profit I correlate it to the same level as clickbait and I'm sure their are other humans out their that get the same taste in their mouth when using the internet, and then go on to do other things instead, which means that they are potentially missing out on learning something vaulable in the future, because of an impression your design made in the past. People should think more about the psycology of design and what the goal of the message of the content their sending is and try not to give into logic like this:

I publish my papers online, they are academic and educational; I want more money. I add ads or political messages onto the website that was before purely educational because it will help me aquire money. You are no longer selling a delicious can of cola but a terrible can of worms

Stock firefox, default tracking protection. I received a single nag about free articles that was easily dismissed. One first-party subscription ad at the bottom of the right column, another at the bottom of the article. No other ads of any kind.

Their website is extremely usable with JavaScript disabled.

[quietly whispers] sssh... reader mode

I wonder if anybody at Harpers ever looks at the numbers to decide if the popups should stay? They should have a minimum success rate that, if signups drop below, they get rid of the popups.