I clicked on this, and it’s immediately asking for my email. No big surprises there.
This however is the copy:
EXCLUSIVE
Unlock your surprise
Sign up to receive your surprise and start sleeping better today
With the big glowing confirm button labelled “Get my surprise” and the dark pattern barely visible skip link “I don’t want a surprise”.
I was aware of the existence of these things but had never paid them the slightest mind, this is just… ick.
As it’s most often seen on news sites - where scrolling too far gives you another article - a handful of reasons.
One: there are frequently still links (think “about us” / “contact us” kind of pages) in the footer that you might need to access, which you can invariably now never reach, because as soon as they’re in view they’re replaced by more content.
Two: as the parent poster so accurately put it, “fucking with the browser history”. It becomes entirely indeterminate whether the back button now returns to the previous site, or just goes back by one piece of content.
Three: the new content is almost certainly unrelated to the page I started on, and not of any interest to me.
Have seen this one here in New Zealand too.
Was a company selling house insulation for $14.88/m², and the owner was a similarly reprehensible individual:
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/christchurch-shooting/111410111/nazithemed-company-owner-charged-with-possessing-objectionable-material