Summary

Gruber amplifies Shubham Bose's analysis of how major news websites have become bloated, hostile experiences, citing the New York Times serving 49MB pages with 422 network requests. He argues that even respected publications like The New Yorker and The Guardian treat their web readers with contempt compared to their print editions, interspersing articles with autoplay videos, repeated ads, and newsletter nags. Gruber notes the irony that publishers respond to declining web traffic by adding more of the reader-hostile elements driving people away. He contends the web is uniquely cursed by being run by decision-makers who don't understand or enjoy the medium, actively pushing users toward apps instead. The core argument is that this degradation is systemic and incentive-driven, not accidental.

Key Insight

The web's decline as a reading medium is driven by decision-makers who despise the medium itself, creating a death spiral where hostile user experiences drive away readers, prompting even more hostile tactics to compensate.

Spicy Quotes (click to share)

• 9

  Your frustration is the product.

• 6

  I disagree only insofar as the reader isn't respected at all.

• 8

  It's like going to a restaurant, ordering a cheeseburger, and they send a marching band to your table to play trumpets right in your ear and squirt you with a water pistol while trying to sell you towels.

• 5

  No print publication on the planet does this.

• 8

  People are spending less and less time on the web because websites are becoming worse and worse experiences, but the publishers of websites are almost literally trying to dig their way out of that hole by adding more and more of the reader-hostile shit that is driving people away.

• 8

  The web is the only medium the world has ever seen where its highest-profile decision makers are people who despise the medium and are trying to drive people away from it.

• 7

  The people making these decisions for these websites are like ocean liner captains who are trying to hit icebergs.

• 6

  How many 30-something blonde white women need hearing aids? It's insane.

Tone

scathing, exasperated, opinionated