As of a few minutes ago old.reddit.com now seems to requre logging in to access it.
Shame as it was still the best place to browse for info about some niche interests.
Edit: Seems like they might be testing the change as it is hit or miss at the moment.
Edit: Adding this to My flilters in uBlock Origin seems to fix the issue for the time being:
||reddit.com^$header=referer:
It’s two things. Bots, yes, but also the communities have gotten really lazy. Shit was fire during peak culture war because people were actively trying to learn. Now it’s like everyone gave up.