I don’t get what you mean here. The sponsored ads are still there, unchanged. It’s presentation of the organic search results that has changed.
Is there anyway to get the Google image search to default back to the old way? This new image search drives me crazy.
(And that’s yet another thing this thread is not about, but that’s the Dope for you–people bring up side topics. Just like in meat-space conversations.)
I installed the NoScript addon on Firefox, then I simple set google.com as an untrusted website; that blocks all Java scripts from Google so it reverts to the good old days of fast, responsive UI.
At first I didn’t like that Gmail doesn’t look as good as the Java script version, but then I noticed I can actually use the middle mouse button to open e-mails in a new tab and I’m sold. 
I also tried using the Adblock Plus addon to filter out “http://www.google.com/extern_js/”, it gets rid of the Instant feature AND the annoying search suggestions that otherwise can’t be disabled. It also disables the preview thingie.
You can also use an Addon called GreaseMonkey, it’s a scripting addon that let’s you do a whole bunch of customization on the way web pages are displayed, just go here and read the steps you need to take to go back to the classic image search for good.
You are totally missing out on “why doesn’t my parakeet eat my diarrhea”.
I’m not going to look it up. Just tell me that I don’t really want to know what it means anyway.
I don’t like it. Mostly, I don’t understand the point - it’s not like I can read anything in the pop-up. It also won’t stay off (same browser session, even).
“Meat-space” = “not the internet”.
This new instant preview doesn’t seem like too much of a problem. I just tested it, and it only starts downloading the thumbnails after you click on the first one.
Figured out why it won’t ‘stay-off.’ It pops up if you click anywhere but a link - which I do often to bring focus to the window.
That’s my problem. It tells me nothing useful, and is very annoyingly unavoidable. I have used two Greasemonkey scripts to turn it off.
For those of you with AdBlock already installed this article gives an easy way to get rid of the previews.
Now I just need to figure out how to stop it from “helping” me search by customizing the results to my location.