2/12/2026 at 3:45:10 AM
I kinda agree with them. I'm not in the US and I don't normally pay for news but I recently signed up to the guardian because they had a promotion.But they started spamming my mailbox immediately with stupid stuff like cooking apps. And they ask all sorts of stuff about my interests. I don't want any of that. But once they know who I am it opens the door to their marketeers to try and extract more money from me.
It's better if I visit the site not logged in with all adblockers active. I do have to agree to tracking then but the adblocker blocks most of that.
It's just weird that I have a better experience if I don't pay than if I do. And it's really expensive, the promotional thing is 6€, and that's a limited time only, the normal price is 12€. I don't read it that much, I just like their take on things sometimes. I read the front page a couple times a week maybe. And sometimes open up an article.
I'll probably cancel when the 6€ thing stops. To be honest I hate reading the news these days anyway. I'd rather not keep up.
by wolvoleo
2/12/2026 at 5:19:09 AM
> It's just weird that I have a better experience if I don't pay than if I do.not if you look from the POV of an advertiser.
If you don't pay, chances are you would not have money to spend on goods being advertised. But if you are rich enough to afford to be a subscriber, chances are you'd be rich enough to buy those goods being advertised!
Therefore, a subscriber is a much more valuable advertising target, which means the guardian can sell you for a higher price than a free user. Given limited real-estate and resources, they'd target a higher value person than a low value person to send the spam.
by chii
2/12/2026 at 8:10:02 AM
This is something I always assumed but thought was cynical. But it's true. Willing to pay for no ads? High value ad target.by MathMonkeyMan
2/12/2026 at 8:57:59 AM
Understood but I hate ads a lot more than I care about the sustainability of websites I use so that tends to disincentivise me from subscribing.by wolvoleo
2/12/2026 at 10:25:35 AM
I've been subscribed to the Guardian for a while and I think that's a bit harsh - yes they offer the cooking app (which I looked at and I don't use) but apart from that the contact from them has been perfectly reasonable?by arethuza
2/12/2026 at 11:20:32 AM
I think the rest of the comms was triggered by me just signing up. But I would deem that negative, I didn't sign up because I wanted to personalise or deepen my interaction, just to send some cash their way.For example: On the guardian website when I created my account it defaulted me to on for sending me communications my post, phone and SMS about their products and services and for marketing research. I find that unacceptable.
They offer an "Unsubscribe from all email" button but this is only available in their online settings, if you click on an unwanted email and unsubscribe there, the above settings remain on.
And it was just an example. It's just every time I sign up for something it's not just that, I also have to unsubscribe for a bunch of mailing lists and surveys I never asked for. And go through all the privacy settings and turn off all the crap where they use my information. Sometimes even periodically like on LinkedIn where they keep adding new settings that default to on.
by wolvoleo
2/12/2026 at 11:35:37 AM
To be fair I did find their subscription process a bit confusing - I think I actually managed to subscribe twice at one point. But since I got that all sorted out I think it's been fine - I mostly use the mobile app (no notifications) and the main website via a desktop browser. I checked my gmail account and I get an email from them on average every 2 or 3 days which is fine as they often do alert me to stuff I am particularly interested in.by arethuza
2/12/2026 at 1:37:28 PM
I had a similar experience with the Providence Journal Bulletin some years back.I subscribed out of a general desire to support good journalism, but it did nothing to reduce the deluge of online ads.
I can't entirely fault them though. They might not have had enough market info at the time to justify making a reduced-ads variant of their website for subscribers.
by CoastalCoder
2/12/2026 at 10:07:54 AM
> But they started spamming my mailbox immediately with stupid stuff like cooking apps. And they ask all sorts of stuff about my interestsWeird, I also subscribed and got nothing like that. Are you sure you're not reading it wrong/subscribed via a rentseeking third party?
by rf15
2/12/2026 at 2:07:54 PM
Long-form news outlets (ie, weekly/monthly/quarterly release) tend to not fall into that scummy, data-mining behaviour the daily news outlets do from my experience. Subscribe to something like the Economist, Private Eye (if in the UK), the Atlantic, or Delayed Gratification instead. They tend to hire well reasoning journalists that do research with due dilligence.by Aromasin