I guess I just disagree. Right now if WSJ comes up in your google results, the link works and you can read the article. If link didn't work and paywall appeared instead of the article, that would be a problem (which is why Google outlawed it).
Would you prefer it instead if WSJ.com just removed themselves from Google? And applied the paywall to everyone? I don't see how that's better. Or is the complaint that any paywall exists anywhere?
If you discover content via Google, you can see it. If you discover content via HN, you can't. Anyone who believes this is ok is pretty much saying they are opposed to net neutrality.
Traffic flowing through one discovery channel is free, but traffic flowing through another isn't. While technically separate from net neutrality as it's happening in a different place in the networking stack, it's the same principle: if it flows over the network, it should be equal.
> Traffic flowing through one discovery channel is free, but traffic flowing through another isn't.
That really misrepresents the case. Its not a difference in traffic costs, its a difference in whether the edge provider is willing to send its content over the network to you. And they are willing to do so if you are paying them directly, or you are sent by someone who is paying them with a certain quantity of exposure.
While you could probably formulate a single principle that would support both what you are calling for here and net neutrality, it probably would be a controversial principle even among people who support net neutrality, and wouldn't represent what many people who do support net neutrality support. Claiming that if someone doesn't agree with you on this they must oppose net neutrality is simply wrong, and unhelpful to either your cause of net neutrality.
The content is the same, it's the business model of the publisher that's different: ads vs subscription.
Google is just serving as an index, you can't read it on Google itself so why should they be able to discriminate content providers based on business model?
This is a strange comment. Google indexes and searches lots of things you eventually have to pay for. Google's a search product. Seems to me the perfectly natural state is "free organic traffic" from Google and the WSJ getting paid.
