Maybe you don’t but can you speak for everyone? The poster seemed to think that was undesirable.

We, the people of the EU, have democratically decided that we don't want them.

I see a problem with people (even democratically) deciding for me. I'd rather like it to be settled down between myself and the website owner.

That does not work. You have no bargaining power.

He had the power to say yes for himself before, and now he doesn't.

How did that democracy work with articles 11 and 13?

The European Union is the antithesis of democracy. If it wasn't, those directives would never have passed.

Democracy does not mean that every decision is good.

Democracy can also undermine itself. If people "democratically" decide they don't want free speech or private property, it's not a democracy any more. I don't assert it's exactly what articles 11 and 13 are doing, but it's a step in this direction.

And the power to use proxies and non personal emails.

Was their content worth my privacy? I will never know as they will not let me see it.

Besides, if they didn’t block me, I can always ensure my privacy to a reasonable degree by using private browsing mode on my browser. That requires very little effort, unlike what I would have to do now — use some VPN provider who quite likely would be monitoring ALL my data not just to that site.

You certainly don't need to use a VPN - much less one that routes all your traffic - to access a site from another place.

I suggest: https://outline.com/

If you didn't think their content was worth it you didn't have to visit. Now no one can.

You can only make that choice if you're informed about the tradeoff. Getting sites to inform users is the main purpose of the GDPR. It's not the EU's fault that the LA Times would rather block people than do that.

> was their content worth your privacy?

What privacy was I losing?

First one that comes to my mind: their advertisers knowing you're on those sites, which page you read, when, for how long, etc. This is mitigated by running an Adblocker and a selective Javascript disabling extension like uMatrix or NoScript, but it would be much better if those sites would let their readers decide if they want to be tracked or not.

Anyway, I'm also blocked on those sites but the same news on LA Times and Fox appear on countless other sites. I'm not losing anything, they're not wasting power and bandwidth for a freeloader. Win/win.

If you agree to pay $10 a month per paper, then you could have it. But majority of people have proven that they will not pay, hence it does not justify to have a paid subscription system without ads.

When more and more people block ads, there will only be a few large sites remaining on the internet because the rest will not be able to survive in the most likely scenario. You could cry all about your freedom then.

It that ever happens I can go back buying newspapers as I did before they moved on the Internet. I bet some of them will always be free, but if only a few of them will be we should be very careful about what we read.