# Popup ads are NOT evil...
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popup-ads-are-not-evil/155282
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [February 15, 2003, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popup-ads-are-not-evil/155282 "2003-02-15T18:46:38Z")
**Posts on this page:** 7
**Page:** 6
### Author:  [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popup-ads-are-not-evil/155282/101 "2003-02-20T06:36:58Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Binarydrone \*
> \*\*I think that one big issue at hand here is that (for the most part) people are paying for their Internet access. This is different than TV (I will talk about cable in a bit).
\*\*
Yes, but you’re not paying _them_ for their bandwidth, you’re paying for your own.
> [@](#):
>
> \*\*
> With TV, assuming a halfway decent antenna of some sort, you
> are not paying for anything but the equipment. Part of the tradeoff here, because it is free, is that we put up with commercials. But wait **Binarydrone** , you say, what about cable? It has ads, doesn’t it?
> Granted but (and please bear in mind that I have not actually had cable for a while now), as memory serves cable is basically either broadcast channels from farther away than you could pull with an aerial, or so-called premium channels that have far less advertising.
> \*\*
Actually, pop ups (or banner ads) are analogous to this situation. You pay your cable company because they provide the infrastructure and equipment to get those channels to you - but you’re not paying the channels for the programming they supply. For that, you watch advertising.
On the internet, your ISP is like the cable company - you pay them for providing the basic equipment required to get on the internet. But you’re not paying all the sites (channels) out there for their content. In order to do that, they often use ads, which are analogous to TV ads in this situation.
Personally, I hate pop ups. I much prefer banner ads. I even click on banner ads sometimes, but never pop up ads, as a matter of principle.
And come to think of it, banner ads would piss people off less AND have more viewers - so many people have pop up blockers now that you’re more likely to have your banner seen than a pop up.
I’m surprised no one has touched on the banner ad vs pop up angle. Everyone is justifying the principal of web advertising in general when defending pop ups, and seem to ignore that there’s a legitimate type of ad - the banner - that gets the job done and doesn’t piss people off.
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### Author:  [@Crowbar\_of\_Irony\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crowbar_of_Irony_3)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popup-ads-are-not-evil/155282/102 "2003-02-20T15:11:58Z")
Hi SenorBeef…
On the thread before, someone says basically every sites is switching to pop-up ads because there is virtually no way to ignore them. I, on my part, agree that Banner ads are fine.
My stance is quite simple - **one or two pop-ups is fine**. But three or four ads which keep popping up whenever I load a page, or ads which spawn other ads when close, is frustrating for the user. Moderation of pop-up ads is better - a site which frustrates the user will cause the user to look for some other alternative.
Worse than pop-upads are pop-up installers. Ever got one of those “CometCursor” stuff which are actually spyware? If you set your sercurity level on IE to low, those things will be automatically installed on one’s computer just by surfing to the site. And those things eat up bandwith (the user’s) and resoruces (RAM) because they actively keeping track of the user’s surfing patterns.
Some sites have more than just pop-up - they have a full-fleged Flash presentation on your screen with sound (which really messes up my MP3, let me tell you that) and they are on major game websites (Can’t recall, but Gamespy seems to be one of them).
Some sites that handle ‘pop-up ads’ differently and are quite successful are Yahoo and Gamespot. Instead of popping up on a seperate window, the advertisement ‘intercepts’ your normal surfing as a full webpage (go to [Gamespot.com](http://Gamespot.com) and hit REFRESH a couple of times and you may see what I mean). I find those less annoying than pop-ups. Yes, it’s more or less the same thing, but I think it lies with the perception.
I don’t see pop-ups going away soon - before the E-commerce bubble burst, pop-ups and ads were what kept the ‘free’ part of the Internet going.
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### Author:  [@D\_Odds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Odds)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popup-ads-are-not-evil/155282/103 "2003-02-20T17:10:10Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by SC\_Wolf \*
> It’s the exact same as the 10 minutes worth of product comercials that have started up before movie theaters roll the coming attraction trailers. It hasn’t always been like that, and people feel if they complain enough, they can keep it from becoming the expected norm.
[hijack]
I heard on NPR’s Morning Edition today that there is a group trying to sue to bar this practice.
[/hijack]
One poster mentioned how this site has no popups. That’s because, as I understand it, the board is underwritten by the Chicago Reader. Therefore, no advertiser support is necessary for the board itself.
I hate all forms of advertising. I hate how advertising is getting more and more intrusive, from blatant product plugs inserted into TV shows and movies to cardboard ad pages in magazines. However, while I complain about their pervasiveness, I understand their purpose - getting products to market, increasing market share and subsidizing media.
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### Author:  [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popup-ads-are-not-evil/155282/104 "2003-02-20T18:39:22Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Fuji Kitakyusho \*
> This discussion is moot.
> The Proxomitron is a freeware local proxy/web filter which will allow you to supress pop-ups/pop-unders and similar phenomena.
Link, please.
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### Author:  [@David\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_B)
#### Post date: [February 21, 2003, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popup-ads-are-not-evil/155282/105 "2003-02-21T00:37:30Z")
SenorBeef said:
> [@](#):
>
> I’m surprised no one has touched on the banner ad vs pop up angle. Everyone is justifying the principal of web advertising in general when defending pop ups, and seem to ignore that there’s a legitimate type of ad - the banner - that gets the job done and doesn’t piss people off.
Er, actually, we have touched on it. In fact, I cited my own income stream to note that banner ads make up only about 25% of my advertising dollars. In other words, the site would disappear if I had to rely solely on banners. Why? Because although you may consider it “legitimate,” as others have noted here, they are too easy to ignore. And advertisers don’t pay much for something that is easy to ignore.
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### Author:  [@Aslan\_of\_Narnia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aslan_of_Narnia)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2003, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popup-ads-are-not-evil/155282/106 "2003-03-14T00:58:15Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by David B \*
> \*\*
>
> **Aslan2** said:
>
> Which means the ad has taken up all of your screen. You can click on a pop ad to make it go away – how is that more difficult than clicking on a remote to change the channel?
> \*\*
> Apparently you’ve never encountered pop ups that do not have an X, or you have to hunt for it or wait for the actual X/close to load.
> \*\*
> Which means the ad covered the entire page. Again, is turning the page so much easier than clicking the little “x” on an ad?
> \*\*
> See above.
> \*\*
> So why do you let it? I click the “close” button on ads before they have a chance to fully load.
> \*\*
> Also see above.
>
> \*\*
> Gee, that’s great. But as I’ve already discussed, banner ads don’t pay very well for precisely the reason that they are very easy to ignore.
> \*\*
> Unlike pop ups, I might click on the banner ad because it’s not gonna disturb my reading, plus it’s alot less annoying.
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### Author:  [@rexnervous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rexnervous)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2003, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/popup-ads-are-not-evil/155282/107 "2003-03-14T04:07:46Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by SC\_Wolf \*
> \*\*I am paying for my bandwidth, I just happen to be buying it in bulk. When I pay my $22 a month, I expect to be able to pull down 118,540,800 kilobits of data for that 28 day period (assuming a 49k connection on my dialup).
>
> Just because I haven’t ever attempted to maximize my bandwidth usasge for 24/7 for an entire month, doesn’t mean I willingly wave my right to maximize my bandwidth usage over a shorter period of time, by bringing down content that is meaningful and enjoyable to me.
>
> Where said “theft” comes in, is when a content provider inisists on sending down content that is the antithesis of enjoyable merely because I access content that I’m seeking out. The 5 seconds worth of bandwith usage spent pulling down a popup ad is 5 seconds longer that I have to wait for the download of the latest quake mod I’ve had running in the background while I surf.
>
> Should I be forbidden to begrudge the popup-using site’s webmaster those 5 seconds, merely because of the fact that I only utilize a small portion of the bandwidth that I purchase every month? I don’t think so. Like many people, I value my time. Using the compensation my employer pays me for my time as a guideline, those 5 seconds are worth 2.5 cents to me, so I’m certainly going to put my two cents in when it comes to expressing how I feel about it.
>
> I realize I have a choice to seek out alternate content from providers who don’t use popups, and I exercise that choice often. \*\*
This argument makes little sense if you are only arguing about pop-ups. Why didn’t you also mention banners/buttons/tiles etc that are also on the site? They take up your bandwidth as well.
So I take it you tend to ‘exercise your choice’ against sites that run banner ads as well?
And what about sites that have content you enjoy and are seeking out, but also have large graphic imagery that you don’t need or like? Is the webmaster stealing your bandwidth there as well?
I’m not defending pop-ups. I work in digital marketing myself, but really dislike pop-ups immensely. But some of the arguments here that rail solely against pop-ups really don’t cut it.
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