In the case of theverge that works, but some "mobile-optimized" sites are worse than the desktop site. For example, navigating to extremetech.com from my ipad 1 takes 20 seconds over wifi before the page is interactive. After load, interaction is still slow and unreliable (and downright buggy). If i force it to use the desktop site the page loads faster and interacts more smoothly.

It's amazing but many mobile editions same to only be designed to make a screenshot to demonstrate to management that the site team did something mobile. Doesn't anybody ever actually try out these sites?