Google Ends Support for Lynx Browser

I just tested changing user agents in Chrome - setting UA to a random string like "fff" gets a search page, but setting it to "Links" or "Lynx" gets "Your browser isn't supported anymore" - which is to say, this doesn't look accidental, but more like these UAs are specifically being blocked.

EDIT: Forging user agent in Links (with links -http.fake-user-agent) gets a usable homepage, but the results page just sends you to a turn-on-your-javascript page.

extraduder_ire · 3 months ago

My impression is that support for less common browsers and other unusual uses of google products has survived due to pet interest by individual googlers and not any sort of widespread policy.

kn0where · 3 months ago

A lot of those individual googlers are longtimers who are now leaving after 15, 20 years. Google has been offering voluntary exit packages this year and I suspect the kind of people who would value Google.com working in Lynx are also the type who have made plenty of money and are disillusioned by what the company has become.

eimrine · 3 months ago

Google loves to search the result with a real URL but since I make any click on that result Google replaces it with some referral link. For example, if I want to open the result not from my connection but from Tor I need to clean each link by hand or even type it from scratch. I am sure this ban was made for poisoning UX for console guys too. What a pity I didn't know I could search from console browser and having more easy life.

Elfener · 3 months ago

This extension removes that behaviour: https://github.com/Rob--W/dont-track-me-google

I wonder to what extent visually disabled internet users are affected by this, since I can imagine at least some of them using lynx with an on-screen reader for a terminal emulator.

duskwuff · 3 months ago

Not to any meaningful degree. Lynx (or other terminal-based browsers) would be an extraordinarily poor choice of browser for a non-sighted user, as it lays text out visually in the terminal (e.g. using color and indentation to distinguish between types of text) and does not provide accessibility cues. Those users are much better served by standard GUI web browsers.

bitpush · 3 months ago

What's the advantage of using lynx as opposed to Chrome/Safari and using the read aloud features?

ryao · 3 months ago

Ask someone who is visually impaired. I know that they historically use browsers that do not support JavaScript. I also am acquainted with one developer who uses software for reading his terminal outloud, although I never asked the specifics of what he uses for web browsing or IRC for that matter. I do know that he loves the iPhone.

That said, I just found this post by a blind person who uses Lynx and complained about it the last time Google broke Lynx support:

https://blind.guru/blog/2019-11-25-endofgoogle.html

salted-fry · 3 months ago

ChrisArchitect · 3 months ago

Suggest changing title to something along lines of "Tell HN: Accessing google in lynx now shows unsupported"

Maybe, like in 2019 when a similar submission got traction, you'll be able to get it restored.

(I am no longer able to use Google with Lynx https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21626995)

userbinator · 3 months ago

Try asking the Google employee there directly if you can.

RAM-bunctious · 3 months ago

I don't feel it's particularly controversial to think that Javascript shouldn't be a requirement to use the internet. This is one step towards making that the case.

rgreekguy · 3 months ago

From a normal browser (don't ask me what I mean by that), with its normal/default user agent, Google search does not work without Javascript. I think at all, any more, but at some point I had got rate limited of sorts, after using the search without Javascript for a little, I got a prompt to enable it.

anon1395 · 3 months ago

Seems like they are cracking down on people who use Google without JavaScript.

teejmya · 3 months ago

Try http://frogfind.com/

benbristow · 3 months ago

Server error

maltelandwehr · 3 months ago

This is more about requiring JavaScript that blocking specific browsers. I think all the new LLM labs (plus all the tools offering SEO services for LLM-based search and answer engines) finally reached a limit of scraping that Google no longer can sustain.

stefanos82 · 3 months ago

Seems like elinks is affected too...bummer!