Tired of being hit by Paywalls or “Ad-Lite” Experiences from Publication Websites?

Forbes recently rolled out their “ad-lite” experience on their website, meaning that if you have ad-block, they won’t let you access their content. It’s understandable, because display ads are one of the main ways that generate the publication revenue.

Predictably, this pissed off a lot of people. Forbes has great content, and I often find myself landing on their website, only to see the ugly “ad-lite” screen that prevented me from accessing that content. Inevitably, I clicked that x on my browser tab and forgot all about it. However, I’ve noticed recently that this has happened more and more and I’ve become increasingly frustrated with not being able to read great content.

I ran across this blog article by Isoroku Yamamoto that described how to bypass Paywalls by using a Chrome Extension that tells websites that you’re one of Google’s agents, rather than a normal web crawler or a person trying to access content. Because of the differentiation in who is accessing content, these publication websites change what information is presented. For ranking and SEO purposes, they want Google to crawl their content pages as quick as possible.

Here’s the trick on how to use this chrome extension to bypass Publication Paywalls so that you can continue to read amazing content for free.

BEFORE

AFTER

(Tested it myself for verification. Note this only works on Chrome.)

Files and instructions are originally from this website. I do not take credit for it.

Download the file here.

Unzip the file into a directory on your computer. Desktop, folder, where ever you can easily find it.

Type in chrome://extensions/ in your Chrome browser.

Click Load unpacked extension… (Make sure Developer Mode is checked in the upper right if you do not see the buttons.)

Credits to elaineou.com

Select the directory where you saved the two files. Enable the chrome extension and visit wsj.com.

There you go! Easy as that.

Here are a list of websites that this currently works for.

http://ftalphaville.ft.com

http://www.ft.com

http://blogs.ft.com

http://www.glassdoor.com

https://www.glassdoor.com

http://blogs.wsj.com

http://www.wsj.com

https://www.wsj.com

http://www.economist.com

http://www.nytimes.com

http://*.blogs.nytimes.com

https://hbr.org

http://www.newyorker.com

http://www.forbes.com

http://online.barrons.com

http://www.barrons.com

http://www.investingdaily.com

http://realmoney.thestreet.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com

If you would like to add a website that isn’t on this list, open the file manifest.json with a Text Editor. I recommend Sublime Text but applications such as Notepad on Windows will work.

You’ll see a screen similar to this

To add a website, follow the formatting of the list, making sure that it starts with “http:// and ends with /*”

example: “http://www.whateveryourwebsiteis.com/*”,

Note: the last line for the website should not have a , or it will break the script.

Save your file. It should now work as well.

The Bigger Picture of All This

Businesses are in business to make money. Publishers make their money through their content with Paywalls, Affiliate Links, Advertising, Guest Posts, Sponsorships, etc. So the question that plagued me initially when I ran across this was: is this right? Is it okay to take away the ability for publishers to make their money on premium content from paywalls?

While I still don’t know the answer to my moral dilemma, what I can say is this. If consumers are not responding well or frustrated in how they get what they want from your business, your business model is likely outdated. In the era of the internet, consumers control how they receive information, and that in turn dictates how you as a business gets paid. If they do not find enough value in paying for content, then they’re going to go somewhere else or simply leave.

I know personally, after Forbes implemented their “ad-lite” version, I never once disabled Ad-block to view their content.

Consumers will dictate how you make your money. If you’re losing customers because you’re not properly monetizing, you won’t survive the digital era. Consumers will always find a way to get what they want, how they want it.

Content publishers are starting to look like the big music publishers that didn’t adapt to the consumers. While the Music Label giants fought relentlessly against music piracy for decades, companies like Spotify, Pandora, Soundcloud and now Apple Music learned how consumers wanted to buy and pay for songs. These companies adapted to the consumers and are thriving.

Learn from consumer behavior, because in the digital world, the consumer gets what the consumer wants, how they want it.