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Comment by Beijinger | Hacker News Reader

I recommend two more:

1. pass paywalls clean.

2. Social Fixer

Rather than introducing additional attack surface and privacy risks with yet another extension you can just use archive.is/archive.ph instead of Bypass Paywalls Clean.

Or, just pay for journalism since it’s not free to do.

You mean Bypass Paywalls Clean? It's illegal and it's not even on the Firefox extension store. You have to download it from some Russian Github alternative and manually install it.

I will say however, it works remarkably well. I haven't seen a paywall in years!

Why should it be illegal?

I don't think it should but it was taken down from Firefox's store because of a DMCA copyright takedown. Firefox was required by law to remove it. Using the extension itself is a legal grey area, but distributing it is usually illegal.

> because of a DMCA

That law doesn't apply to many HN readers

It does apply to Mozilla, and some version of it applies to every country that trades with the USA (because the USA makes all trade deals contingent on it)

Exactly. And I don't think there's many Cuban, Iranian, and Yemeni people on HN

It’s not illegal. But it’s a step too far for some.

It's unquestionably illegal to distribute. As in, if Mozilla (or anyone else hit by the DMCA) were to add it back to the store, they would be acting illegally.

Why do people keep repeating this BS. The DMCA doesn't grant random lawyers the ability to make things illegal. All does give platforms the ability to get out of lawsuits by pre-emptively taking down the things mentioned in the notification but that doesn't make not doing that illegal.

It's not. Op is wrong

It's been taken down by DMCA copyright strikes on every western platform that could distribute it. That's why you can't find it on the Firefox extension store anymore

None of that means it’s “illegal”. You apparently think something being removed to reduce legal risk means it’s illegal, but that doesn’t follow.

It's illegal to distribute. Unambiguously. That's how DMCA works. If Mozilla were to add it back to the store, they would be acting illegally.

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