Here’s a strange development in the world of online news consumption. A switch has been flipped that now prevents iPad users from accessing the New York Post’s web content in the iOS-powered browser, Safari. Non-iOS tablets can still navigate to the website and mobile phones, including the iPhone, can get into the mobile site. Navigate there in Safari for iPad, however, and you’ll be redirected to a product page that asks you to grab the official New York Post app (via PaidContent.org).
The app itself costs $1.99, but you’ll need a subscription if you want to read through regular content. The minimum you can spend is $6.99 per month, though $39.99 and $74.99 6-month and 12-month options, respectively, are also available. Print subscriptions don’t include access to the digital content and vice versa, so if you want your Post served fresh daily both ways, you’ll need to pony up two times.
Or you could also, you know… not. For the time being at least, this paywall is restricted to iPad users in the Safari browser. All smartphones and non-iOS tablets golden, but even if all you have is an Apple tablet, there are still options.
A number of third-party web browsers are available in the App Store. While Safari is tops for the platform, a few of these others — Atomic Web Browser comes to mind — are perfectly functional and easy-to-use, with the added benefit of including a settings option for changing what’s called the user agent so websites detect a browser other that iPad Safari. If you’re using a jailbroken tablet all you need is a little app called User Agent Faker (available on Cydia), which essentially does the same thing for Safari. Alternatively, you could just get your news elsewhere.
