BUT, the content itself needs to be interesting enough to be worth the extra work. Often, this pattern favors companies that are already established. The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal are both companies that implement hard paywalls. Why? Because they have so much cultural capital that they don’t mind losing a few users if it forces existing users into paying customers.
In that case, what about the locked content that you had to pass to get here? Social media giants like Facebook and Instagram force sign ins to access their content. Why force users to sign in if there is no monetary gain? Simple. Data collection.
There is a lot of information that you can gather from a user’s behavior, and the only way to track that behavior is to have some kind of record of their interaction with the page. Sign-ins function great for this.
While cookies are an alternative option, sign-ins come with the added benefit of email. Signing in to a website gives the company free reign to send emails to the new user until they decide to unsubscribe. Companies that ask for a phone number can even send text messages. It increases engagement to their site, which allows them to collect more information and personalize their ads to suit the person accessing their site. It’s a not very subtle feedback loop.