I just went to look at weather.com to see how big this storm that just started is expected to be. I clicked on the weather map to see the radar-in-motion view. As happens with increasing frequency these days, a stupid Flash ad came up. COVERING HALF OF THE RADAR MAP. Who the hell does this and how can we hunt them down and kill them? Half the time you can’t find a way to close the ad, and they don’t go away even if you let it sit. I’ve gone to read articles on sites before where 90% of the content of the page is covered with one of these ads. WTF!?
I got so spoiled by Pith Helmet for Mac, (suggested by Shagnasty, IIRC) that kills flash ads, I almost quit using weather.com because of all the flash ads. It won’t work with the latest update for Safari. 
I hope they get an update soon!
I’ve taken to using Accuweather and Wunderground.com rather than weather.com because of the freakin ads, but I like weather.com’s hour-by-hour forecast and radar maps better 
Flashblock for Firefox.
And weather.gov is the National Weather Service’s site. It’s where all the commercial sites get their data from anyway, and is taxpayer supported, so no ads.
http://radar.weather.gov/ridge/radar.php?rid=FFC&product=NCR&overlay=11101111&loop=yes
This is a good use of flash.
If you find out, I’ll volunteer to be on the hit squad! While we’re at it, can we kill the people who put action and sound ads on the lower part of the TV screen during the freakin’ show I’m watching? You just know they’re in cahoots!
AAAAH!!! AAAAAAHHH!H!!! MUST KILL THOSE MOFOS!!! I don’t remember what I was watching, but it was something on Spike once, and a Borg ship popped up on the bottom of the screen, and the Enterprise appeared and shot it down with a sound effect. I replayed the scene like 5 times in TiVo trying to figure out what the people in MY SHOW were saying but I never was able to figure it out with the stupid sound effects playing over it. I hate those people!!!
You can get FlashBlock, which requires you to right-click on every flash item on your screen that you don’t want to see, and add its URL to a database. You will eventually have thousands of URLs in your FlashBlock database. Or you can uninstall Flash altogether, which is what I did after I got tired of right-clicking on ads.
Nitpick: this is what the AdBlock extension does. FlashBlock will automatically prevent any Flash frames from loading, displaying instead a little “F in a circle” icon that can be clicked to allow the Flash content to load.
What exactly is it you’re nitpicking? I’ve described exactly how it works, and you posted to say how it works. Except that it doesn’t automatically block Flash frames, you have to tell it to block that image by right clicking on the Flash object. I know, I did it several thousand times.
Yes, no use of Flash at all is often the best use of Flash – unless we’re talking about what sort of pastry to bring when come back or determining where exactly you can see lions.
(The above link is good old-fashioned Java.)
AdBlock and FlashBlock are two different extensions.
FlashBlock does automatically block Flash frames, and replaces them with a frame containing a little icon that looks like this, which you can then click if you want to see the Flash content.
Adblock is the one you train by right-clicking the image (or link, or Flash frame, etc.) and selecting the appropriate option from a tooltip like this one, which tells it to block all images from that source in the future.
So, if someone wanted the functionality you describe, they would actually need Adblock, not FlashBlock. If the main goal was to avoid seeing any Flash at all, though, FlashBlock would be the better choice, since it preemptively blocks all Flash content with no need for user input.
When I went to a website with Flash animation, I would right click on the Flash animation, select FlashBlock, and get a dialogue box with the URL of the Flash object, and the option to block that URL. I would also get the opportunity to block the URL for the frame in which the Flash object resided. This is how I ended up with thousands of blocked URLs in FlashBlock.
I don’t know how to make it any clearer to you that this is exactly how the program I have works. I’ve explained it three times. You seem to want to disagree. I do not happen to be delusional, and I do not generally make posts three times in a row to display my ignorance. I am telling you that this is the experience I have had. No matter how much you want to disagree with it, it happened daily for months, until I uninstalled Flash.
Please, don’t get upset. I’m not trying to be insulting, or to suggest that you’re ignorant; I apologize if I came across that way.
Still, if you’re certain that the extension you were using was called FlashBlock, I don’t know how to reconcile the two different experiences we’ve had with it. Just to be certain, I uninstalled both extensions, reloaded Firefox, and reinstalled them one at a time.
The one called FlashBlock, installed on its own, works as I described it above. When turned on (from the Tools -> Extensions -> Options menu), it automatically stops Flash content from being displayed. There is no need to right-click on anything (you can, however, right-click on the Flash frame to select an option to allow Flash from that site, as shown in this screenshot). The comments from the extension download page I linked earlier confirm this.
The one called Adblock works similarly to the program you describe. It allows you to right-click on a Flash frame (or an image, or most anything really) and add it to a database of sources to block. I, too, have a list of thousands of blocked URLs, but they are most assuredly blocked through the Adblock extension, as you can see here.
Perhaps there was an older version of FlashBlock that worked as you recall. I don’t know; I’ve only had it for a few months. Right now, though, if somebody wanted an extension that did what you described – allowed you to right-click on images or Flash frames to block all content from that source – they would want the extension called Adblock. So, if you’re recommending that somebody might want that particular functionality, that’s the one they’d need. That’s alls I’m sayin’. 
Thankyouthankyouthankyou!
I agree with Roland Orzabal; when Flashblock is installed and enabled, all I see is a little round play icon in the window instead of the Flash animation. Most of the time, I just ignore this, but if it’s something I want to play, I click on the play icon.
I like Flash and don’t want to uninstall it. I may try the flashblock. But this thread is getting too reasonable. I just came in to proclaim my hate for those things, too. I read fast, so the damn thing always shows up when I’m at least 3-4 lines into the article…distracting me. Gah! The Onion is particularly annoying these days, to the point where I’ve just about stopped reading it.