IMDb is pulling up the shutters: if you want to read user reviews in future, you need an account. What's behind the change and what alternatives remain.

TIL about it after reading this post. It seems to have started around 17/April

From the article:

a login barrier for reading does not really stop AI scrapers because bots can be equipped with accounts within a few minutes. Instead, many suspect that Amazon’s main aim is to increase the number of registered users. After all, those who are logged in can be tracked better – and can be provided with more targeted recommendations and advertising.

Are there open source alternatives to it?

  • SolarMonkey@slrpnk.netEnglish
    12·
    14 days ago

    I stopped using IMDB ages ago when they started serving their ads through the same domain they host all their other images on, so blocking ads broke the site entirely.

    I left those ads blocked though, and just stopped using IMDB. Looks like I made the right choice.