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Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

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Re: Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

#81
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use the Bypass Paywalls extension [0] for this, and it works great with Unclutter. [0] https://gitlab.com/magnolia1234/bypass-paywalls-chrome-clean

Is this the same extension as https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome ? I've been using the latter for years now too. It still doesn't work with hard paywalls like the ones on economist.com or wsj.com.

No it's a fork that strips out tracking info like Google Analytics and adds new features on top of it. Works for all the sites I've tried it on.

Re: Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

#82
post #59

i always want to do this but instead get a sharable url. i wrote a quick, dirty version of it https://reader-next.pages.dev/?url=https://netflixtechblog.m...

Nice! Interestingly I had the opposite goal -- uncluttered articles should still have the same URLs.

It makes total sense for sharing!

Re: Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

#83

I am ashamed to advertise it so bluntly but I wrote a similar tool that might address some of the above requests. The browser extension works with all desktop browsers, Firefox Beta/Nightly on Android (that's how I use it) and with Kiwi Browser on Android. The IOS shortcut has only been tested via appetize.io. There's a sort of sync - RSS and a dedicated web page. Bypasses some paywalls and most ublock/adbock blocker…

Oh nice! Seems like "send articles to Kindle" is its main selling point?

Re: Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

#84

> Monetisation has proven to be hard What paths have you taken/considered? Given that this is open source, how would you get users to pay?

Additional premium features around the "article library" aspect of the extension. So for example an account to access it from mobile devices, AI topic classification, additional customisation etc.

I think it's hard to make money from reader modes alone, with so many free alternatives. But you know more about that topic than I do. Any suggestions?

Re: Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

#85
I use this category of tool all the time, and I've tried at least a dozen of them.

Based on about an hour of usage, Unclutter is my favorite -- nudging out my current tool-of-choice (Tranquility!). Great job.

I would obviously like for you to continue development. Having said that, I have no great monetization advice. Nor do I even have any burning desire for new features. While I would expect to make progress on the latter, the money thing will be tough.

Some thoughts on money: Since I'm a power user of this type of software, I might pay $10/yr or so for Unclutter. But I have been told that such a low price do not a business model make. I think that your tool is squeezed between the "it's a vitamin" and "lots of good free options exist" pincers. As a sidenote, social features don't appeal to me.

Whatever you decide, I wish you luck. I'm on Firefox/Mac BTW.

Re: Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

#86
post #43
post #41

This looks very neat, I know it's an edge case (And it's not great to build Safari extensions, been there) but do you have any plans for Safari support?

Not an edge case, I've been tracking this for a while: https://github.com/lindylearn/unclutter/issues/13 Someone else in this thread suggested a version for mobile Safari which made supporting this even more interesting. No promises, but hopefully I can get to this before the end of the year.

Great to hear, looking forward to it!

Re: Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

#87
post #68

Playing the devil's advocate: Why is Firefox Reader mode not good enough? And also please note that Mozilla has their algorithm in the open here: https://github.com/mozilla/readability

I just wish we could remove the toolbar that I don't need yet is permanently stuck at the top.

Re: Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

#88
post #34
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the videos look like images, both on Firefox and chromium on linux. No play button is displayed, no video playback control bar either, and pressing on space bar does not start the video. Right-clicking over the video shows a context menu with "play" option. It is confusing to see these as screenshots of the cluttered interface and no indication that these are videos.

Do the videos auto-play for you when they appear? I made the bad decision of hand-coding the landing page in React, this is the result of it :)

I think they have autoplay disabled, I have autoplay disabled as well and have the same experience. If I enable autoplay it works. (Firefox)

Re: Show HN: Unclutter – Reader mode, but better

#89

I use this category of tool all the time, and I've tried at least a dozen of them. Based on about an hour of usage, Unclutter is my favorite -- nudging out my current tool-of-choice (Tranquility!). Great job. I would obviously like for you to continue development. Having said that, I have no great monetization advice. Nor do I even have any burning desire for new features. While I would expect to make progress on the…

Thank you! I agree, Unclutter might be a useful product but not a good business. At least there are other benefits to working on an open-source project like this.

Have you tried the "library" aspect of the extension? Click on the "Saved in library" button in the top left and you'll see all your recent articles. What do you think of that?

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