Enough with the bottom-of-the-page overlay ads!

Seems like on a lot of web pages these days, only about 50% has to do with content. The rest is ads and other clutter. Fine - my mind can filter that out with no problem, and advertising equals upkeep of the site and free content for me. I get it.

But when there is a bar near the bottom of the page that I actually have to click to get rid of - or worse - an overlay ad, do you know what I do? I close that window. I’m looking at you Cracked.com and Yahoo, sites I would normally use more. But when you do obnoxious things like that, I direct my traffic elsewhere. To say nothing of the fact that I would never, EVER purchase or use anything advertised in that manner.

I can’t be the only person who clicks elsewhere on first site of this crap. How fucking annoying does advertising have to become before they realize it’s driving some people away?

+1

This isn’t quite the same thing, but I’ve been waiting for an opportunity to complain about it: websites whose comment section updates in “real time”— which sounds like a great idea, but in practice it means that whatever you’re reading suddenly gets pushed off the screen whenever someone posts a new comment to an upstream thread. Slate.com is one primary offender.

Just let us READ, please. No shoving shit around, and no obstructive overlays (the modern day equivalent of pop-ups).

The other side of this is I complained here awhile ago about the newpaper ads that were half sheets folded over the top of a section I wanted to read, or worse yet attached to it. I have to deal with getting the stupid ad out of the way before I can read what I want. The reaction here? Meh.

So, I wouldn’t be surprised to see that sort of reaction to the ads you are talking about from most people. I hate them too, especially when I’m on dial up, but they must work and it appears most folks don’t care.

Ad Block Plus, maybe? I just went over to Cracked, and no ads anywhere.

Adblock solves 95% of this. There are still websites that hard-code a time-delayed intrusive window over the content. They get one F5 from me. If it happens again, I soar heroically away, never to return.

This shit drives me INSANE. Nothing makes me rage harder . . . except when those ads then have videos in them that are awful and loud. Yargh. . .

“Hey! I’m trying to read here!” is what I am know to exclaim as I try to surf. “Now, where is the tiny little x to get rid of this annoying shit?”

Good lord, yes. ESPN.com does this and it makes the comments absolutely impossible to read…

which might be a good thing. Never mind.