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[return to "Tell HN: t.co is adding a five-second delay to some domains"]
1. kens+71[view] [source] 2023-08-15 04:20:25
>>xslowz+(OP)
I can confirm. NYT shows a five-second redirect delay: "wget https://t.co/4fs609qwWt". It redirects to gov.uk immediately: "wget https://t.co/iigzas6QBx"
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2. craftk+e3[view] [source] 2023-08-15 04:37:03
>>kens+71
Oddly enough the delay is reduced to 1 second by using curl's useragent string (wget --user-agent='curl/8.2.1' https://t.co/4fs609qwWt)
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3. ilikeh+P5[view] [source] 2023-08-15 05:09:16
>>craftk+e3
Seeing this makes me wonder if it's some sort of server-side header bidding ad server gone haywire, rather than something nefarious. Why would they only delay browser agents otherwise?
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4. nvm0n2+bq[view] [source] 2023-08-15 08:59:49
>>ilikeh+P5
Probably a phishing/malware scan gone wrong then. NYTimes has Twitterbot in its robots.txt which might be related?

Even if it's deliberate, I don't see how people can complain. Google has outright blocked Breitbart for years. They prevent results from that domain from appearing at all unless you specifically force it with site: and apparently HN does the same. Politically motivated censorship and restricting "reach" is just how Silicon Valley rolls. Pre-Musk Twitter did freeze the New York Post's account and many other much worse things. It'd be a shame for Musk to be doing this deliberately, even though it seems unlikely. But that's the problem with creating a culture where that sort of behavior is tolerated, isn't it? One day it might be turned around on you.

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5. spider+ou[view] [source] 2023-08-15 09:44:46
>>nvm0n2+bq
Does the value Breitbart adds to the internet outweigh the negatives of turning people into dangerous fascists by weaponizing misinformation? No.

Does the value added by sources like the NYT outweigh the negatives of being occasionally biased or outright wrong? Yes.

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