There are several threads running right now about the terrors of the new banner advertising.
What is the fuss about? Or in other words, will someone explain what I am not seeing on my browser?
I use IE 6, on Windows XP. I have NOD32 antivirus. (Straight off the shelf, no tweaks, no whistles and bells, because I know nothing about how to do that stuff. )
When I start the Dope, I go to the home page www straightdope com and then within one or two seconds I click on the “message boards” link.
On the home page, I see (and ignore!) an ad that appears above the SD trademark banner “fighting ignorance since 1973”. The ad is at the top of the page, the same size as the StraightDope trademark banner; and even if I glance at it, it doesn’t annoy me, because I am already focusing my attention farther down the page for the link I know I want, labelled “message boards”.
There is also an ad that appears on the right side of the screen, underneath the caricature. But I can’t see it unless I scroll down the page, and I don’t do that, because I immediately click on “message boards”.
Result: I don’t see any obnoxious advertising.
When I get to the message board page, and then go to a specific forum, I see no advertising at all. The Google ads (which, BTW, I thought were totally harmless, and sometimes a little bit fun to read) have disappeared.
So what is everybody bitching about? I feel like I’m missing out on some kind of important community experience…
