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Comment by inigyou | Hacker News Reader

[to prove you are not a crawler and read this comment, please deposit $2.00]

I think that to prove I am not a crawler I probably just need to supply a Safari user agent string. The crawlers on my sites actually self identify for the most part. The malicious ones are banned when they try to post spam.

Anyway, what’s wrong with making 2 cents? :)

The troubling part for me is that a system like this could also just as easily be pawned onto the humans (I realize it technically already is with the subscription model internet, but there are still plenty of open sites). A feature like this seems to me will lead to an internet where no one can browse anything without having a wallet connected and paying for each attempted access. Exactly what the internet is not supposed to be.

I don’t see how this is different from having Stripe easily available to any web developer. I want this feature, but it doesn’t mean I’m going to add it to every website I build. I think of it as Stripe pay wall at infrastructure level rather than a JavaScript popup. If we look at NYT, WP, many already do this. But HuffPost and Reddit rely on different models.

I don’t think this will make the internet less open, I think the internet is already pretty much less open. Who blogs these days for free? They rely on medium or substack, and have no choice, they submit to these platforms rules about the articles they write, even though they’re pretty generous.

Now, if the reward system was as open as say, Bitcoin, I think there would be a lot more independent and different bloggers and journalists, and independent platforms.

Once you have the payment system, all I have to do is make a site that looks valid until you make a payment. Then it will display the trolololololololololol gif and keep your money.

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