If it wasn’t for the SDMB settings that caused a new window to popup whenever you click on a link in a post, I would have long ago disabled popups in my browser. What can I say, except that the nuisance value of killing “World’s Largest Casino!” and “X10 Cameral Cheaper Than Dirt!” is less to me than the value of not having to poke Cecil’s hamster in the ass every time I return from clicking on a link.
But weather.com has sunk to a new low. A low so low that I hope the view out the weather.com windows shows nothing but slimy slug genitalia, earthworms, and the decaying corpses of Internet advertising executives.
So I go to weather.com to check tomorrow’s weather forecast. It promptly appears, as does the usual popup ad. Whatever. Click on the close window box and it’s gone, and I don’t even have to know what you’re selling.
But no. It turns out that this is the most evil ad ever. More evil than infinitely reproducing porn popups, more evil than a mailbox full of spam. The “X” close window bow was just out of reach to the right. So I grabbed the blue bar and dragged it to the left.
You fuckers! You goat-molesting, sheep-fucking, brain-dead family court reject judge motherfuckers!
The mouse drags the toolbar all the way to the left side of the screen. The close window box is still not in sight. I drag again. Same thing. In fact, the toolbar has just barely faded from darkest blue to not quite darkest blue. So I drag again, and the damn box still isn’t in sight. Now it’s war.
It takes eight full-screen drags to get this goddamn popup to finally reveal its close window box. All for a fucking poll! Yes, that’s right, the Weather Channel just wanted to know how satisfied I was with their web site. Well I answered their damn poll alright. My language was slightly better than it was here.
weather.com has been permanently removed from my bookmarks. Eat shit and die, Weather Channel.
Well, I just went there and I didn’t even get a popup. Not a one. Nil, Nada, Bugger All.
I get them from other sites, so I know I haven’t disabled JavaScript.
Maybe, they were testing it when you visited, saw what was happening and pulled it.
OBTW, you can use ALT-F4 and close the window without dragging and clicking etc, etc.
One: to close any window, Windows: alt f4 , Mac Command-W.
Also, you needn’t have auto-pop activated. In mac, all you have to do is one of the following:
Hold the mouse button an extra second or so to get the contextual menu, choose “open in new window” OR
hold the command key and click on the link, it will pop open in a new window automatically.
Windows: right-click and choose “open in new window”
I almost NEVER click a link within the same window. It’s just a thousand times more useful and convenient for me to always have a fresh window.
Oh, and all sites that use popups must end up as a listing on fuckedcompany.com as soon as possible.
Well I went to weather.com to check to see if I get it. All I got was the usual pop-up window, which I promptly closed. I think what you ran across was a mistake/bug. Let’s just hope some less scrupulous web site doesn’t see that and say “hhmmm what a fantastic idea”
Slightly off topic. I hate those pop-ups that pop-up, then immediately disappear behind all the other windows you have open. Forcing you to search for it to close it or go down to the task bar to close it.
I know the alternative methods of closing windows, guys. For instance, I frequently right click on offending program box on the bottom bar and choose close from there. I don’t like Alt-F4 because, when multiple boxes appear, it’s too easy to kill windows you have open on purpose.
The reason I detested this particular popup is that it was clearly intended to frustrate anybody who chose to kill it with a simple click on the X. I knew what they were doing as soon as the first short click and drag didn’t reveal the close window box. At that point, they’ve already insulted me and it’s just a case of seeing how bad the insult really is. I mean, they can’t possibly think I’m going to give up trying to close the damn box and answer their stupid poll just to get rid of it, can they? Surely, even Internet marketing types aren’t that dumb.
Use Pop-Up stopper. It only stops javascript pop-ups, not TARGET=NEW ones (like the ones on here seem to be). Plus you can still get a JS pop-up you want by CTRL+CLICK. And you can disable/enable it any time from the start bar.
I ran into a nice one recently… when you moved the mouse over to the close button, well, obviously, you had to move the cursor over the window, right?.. So it resized on mouseover, and the close button suddenly ran away.
Oh, I liked that one. I liked it so much, I’m planning to buy the company. Then I will find the person who thought that one up, and show my appreciation in a special ceremony in his/her honour. I won’t spoil the surprise, so let’s just say it involves a large barrel, part-full of rock salt and razor blades.
(Of course, before I could do that, I’d have to remember what the damn thing was advertising… which, for the life of me, I can’t. Shows you just how effective these things are, doesn’t it?)
That is a ‘pop-under.’ That is also the reason why Hotmail is on my shit list. In addition to what you mentioned, it also FREEZES THE WINDOW for a few seconds while you wonder what the hell is going on. Then, the outline shows… I go to click where the Close will be… and it pops behind… and I’ve suddenly clicked on that message from my ex that I swore I wouldn’t read.
Minty, stop bitching and go to www.panicware.com and download the pop-up stopper. You don’t need to worry about sites like SDMB popping up new windows, they pop up just fine.
My only bitch is when attempting to view, say, a video that pops up in a new window, or open a new browser, you have to hold either CTRL or SHIFT. But you get used to it quickly.
Screw their survey. It results in spam and snailmail spam.
Obviously you haven’t had the pleasure of the allstate ad where the little pipe marches up the screen, busts, and then causes a flood, brought to you by your fiends at Allstate. When that one got me I changed my browser’s ways.
Weather.com is now a ‘restricted site’. Restricted sites have NO access to Java, ActiveX, scripting, any of that shit. None. I turned it all off except for pictures. (IE settings, YMMV)
Popups in restricted sites are now largely a thing of the past.
Animated, flashing ads now are calm, still pictures.
And, NO floods.
I am currently experimenting with a java/activex/script - free lifestyle on all internet sites. Very few problems, less than the popups were.
I’ve been that way for quite some time…my restricted sites settings are almost exactly the same as my normal settings. I don’t need my everyday browsing interrupted by pop-ups, and scripts that make an image change just because my mouse runs over them aren’t worth my time either. While I’m at it, I turn all sounds off as well. I don’t need to hear some web designer’s favorite song rendered in MIDI, or hear wacky sound f/x.
The only sites that I allow scripts are those that absolutly need them, and I know that they don’t use pop-ups (if I site I come across looks interesting, I always check the source code). Those I put in “trusted”, and even there the ActiveX is disabled. I to this day cannot figure out why my.yahoo.com needs ActiveX.
Ooooh, yeah. MSNBC.com does this. Worse - two windows pop up and sneak around back, so to speak, but one of them instantly closes back up again, leaving an innocent-looking popup ad in the other one. This being a MS service, I just know that that window that closed itself was doing something sneaky and evil. I try to catch it every time and close it, but it’s always been too fast so far.
Nothing like a good weather.com rant to make me laugh. I will remember to show the guys who sell these pop-ups your thread on Monday when I go back to work. As for that link on the other pop ups- “shoshkeles”. It is true and they are a lot less annoying than normal pop ups or pop unders, so I wouldn’t worry.
