Well, I do not have an account and when I open any profile on it right now, I cannot read it properly. I cannot click on posts. I cannot read replies. I cannot open images.
In my opinion, that is quite far from "functional".
Such a behavior alone is a sufficient justification, in my opinion, for the services like xcancel to exist.
And if the X social network does not want their content to be publicly available, fine. They are free to gate it behind a login.
There is no "gymnastics" needed. And those "middleware" layers are working just fine.
A user just opens the original X link in xcancel or some of the similar web service. And it will display the actual content only. Without ads and without other user-alienating features.
I think that it is also way simpler than "creating an account".
Suggesting a burner account to access the most basic functionality of a website is quite the technique to prove your point that the website is the most functional website.
??? Have you never tried to visit X on a mobile device? Functional is far from what I'd call it, given that you can't see replies to the tweet or indeed do much else on the site