[stjohnswarts]

You can't win this argument, hackernews isn't "pay to play". You are currently playing with it and you didn't pay even a microtransaction. Why do you keep saying it is pay to play? For whatever reason HN providers are doing it as a free service and you aren't paying anything.

[olah_1]

HN sells me as their audience to advertisers right?

Would you say that Youtube is “free” as well?

Many people would simply prefer a more transparent / straight forward business model and I don’t think they are wrong for having that preference.