I noticed a new sensation today as I was looking at the news article on the web. I was about to start scrolling down and felt a pang that if I scroll, the whole page might be suddenly obscured by a pop-up prompting me to pay for access or sign up to a newsletter.

I don’t fault publications for trying to get paid. I’m sure this kind of paywall is used because it works. I actually think the constant frustrations of paywalls got me to pay for access to some publications during the 2016 US election.

It can’t be a good sign that I’m worried (not matter how insignificantly), about scrolling on a web page, lest if be clobbered by some kind of promotional overlay.