Steven Den Beste has found the magic bullet to getting around registration requirements at the Washington Post web site. An added bonus is that his method should work with ANY news site listed on Google News. Sure they want to trap you in a registration system on entrance, but they're certainly not going to jeopardize getting seen on Google by requiring that the Google Bot register.
Now if some enterprising programmer would write a plug-in or Active X control that would automatically send Google referral data to sites that require registration, that would be very cool.
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Comments (6)
Is it just me, or is all th... (Below threshold)1. Posted by James Joyner | February 15, 2004 6:48 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Is it just me, or is all that a lot more trouble than just "registering" with WaPo? Personally, I don't mind telling them that I was born in 1900, am female, and am whatever the first thing is in each of the drop-down boxes. That's the least I can do for their content.
1. Posted by James Joyner | February 15, 2004 6:48 PM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on February 15, 2004 18:48
2. Posted by Sean Hackbarth | February 15, 2004 9:01 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Anyone without a computer engineering degree or a MCSA has no idea what Steven wrote. For a guy who's a good writer he didn't make himself clear at all.
2. Posted by Sean Hackbarth | February 15, 2004 9:01 PM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on February 15, 2004 21:01
3. Posted by Kevin | February 16, 2004 12:43 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
What he was trying to say was that if you are referred from Google, or can get your browser to claim it was referred from Google you'll bypass the registration traps. Saying it is easy. Doing it is a bit harder...
3. Posted by Kevin | February 16, 2004 12:43 AM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on February 16, 2004 00:43
4. Posted by Kathy K | February 16, 2004 8:11 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Get Opera. WaPo has been letting anyone using the Opera browser right on through. Opera has some problem with their registration system and they gave up on it after a lot of complaints.
4. Posted by Kathy K | February 16, 2004 8:11 AM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on February 16, 2004 08:11
5. Posted by Jalal Abu Jarhead | February 16, 2004 8:11 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
I'm not sure if MCSAs or even MCSEs will figure it out, Sean, but I'll bet the MCSDs are already thinking about writing that ActiveX control (we're all Microsoft ho's, anyway). <grin/>
5. Posted by Jalal Abu Jarhead | February 16, 2004 8:11 PM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on February 16, 2004 20:11
6. Posted by Kevin | February 16, 2004 10:01 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
That's all I was asking for :-).
6. Posted by Kevin | February 16, 2004 10:01 PM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on February 16, 2004 22:01