Unvis.it

done · 2013–2017

Read the clickbait without paying for it with a pageview. Probably not legal, said its own FAQ.

gonedjur's repo on GitHub

Put unvis.it/ in front of a link and you got the article without the site getting your visit. No pageview, no ad money, no reward for whoever wrote it to make you angry. You could read the idiocy and share it without paying for it with your attention.

The FAQ was two lines. “Is this legal? Probably not.” “Does it work with any website? Certainly not.” Both answers held up.

The code later turned up on GitHub, most likely put there by the person I sold it to. The README calls it “horrible spaghetti code”. I cooked most of the original spaghetti, so no complaints.

People used it the way it was meant. Joakim Jardenberg explained why he linked through it to media he criticised. A manifesto for fixing the internet recommended it for attention-seeking sites. Jacques Rousseau, who teaches critical thinking in Cape Town, suggested it for sharing clickbait without feeding it.

It grew to about 10,000 users a month, and I sold it in 2017. It still runs, owned by someone else. I don’t know who.