I love the lens effect at the bottom of the viewport and design of the site overall, really cool. Do you have a post about that effect - or is the best way to learn about it in the developer tools?
I’m the opposite end of spectrum. I really disliked the frosted glass look on images as they loaded and left the page before finishing reading due to how off-putting I found it to be.
It didn't make me leave the page, but I agree that I too found the effects annoying and off putting.
I also left the page early. I enjoy reading, and wasn't able to do that as effectively on this website.
Too bad it makes the whole thing laggy enough that I didn't get past the first few paragraphs on my phone, and there's no obvious way to disable it
Alas :( my phone is fine scrolling at 120hz with the effect (iPhone 15 pro max)
Thank you. You can investigate progressive blur.
As another top-level comment pointed out, this is a bit of a dark-pattern to indicate paywalled content. In this case, I think it would be better without it.