Block that pop-up window at your own risk (NYTarticle)
Thread Starter
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: Europe
Posts: 3,261
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Block that pop-up window at your own risk (NYTarticle)
Lisa Guernsey NYT
Monday, November 3, 2003
The Google toolbar, a thin row of buttons and a query window that sits within the Internet Explorer browser, has become a big hit, with millions of people using it each day. Last summer it attracted even more users when Google added a pop-up blocker to the toolbar's features, effectively filtering the unsolicited advertisements that appear along with many Web pages.
"Google Toolbar is great for stopping pop-ups," one user in a public newsgroup wrote last weekend. On the same day, a fan of the toolbar in a forum about free software crowed, "Up to 2,190 pop-ups blocked!" Dozens of similar postings can be found across the Internet.
But Google's blocker and others like it are having unintended consequences for some Web designers. Over the years, growing numbers of Web sites have been designed to include pop-up windows that are not advertising and that users may consider helpful rather than annoying. These legitimate pop-ups - like calendar updates and explanations of new navigation features - enable designers to alert visitors to news without substantially revising the home page.
But today many such pop-ups never see the light of day. "Visitors will load a site that is supposed to have a 'Welcome' message and they won't even know that they missed it," said Greg Franseth, the manager of Web services at the University of Kentucky. Recently, he said, many graduate students at the university failed to learn about a major schedule change that was posted on a departmental Web page "because they didn't get the pop-up."
Google's software is designed to unobtrusively alert users whenever a pop-up is being blocked by flashing a quick starburst of yellow near the user's cursor. It also enables users to tell Google which sites they want to exclude from pop-up restrictions. But, as Google acknowledges, if a person arrives on a page and notices that a pop-up has been blocked, there is no way to retrieve that pop-up to see what was missed.
Solid numbers on how many people have installed pop-up blockers are hard to come by, but in the past year large Internet service providers like America Online and MSN have offered the software to their customers. Dozens of stand-alone software products can be downloaded free, or for a small fee, from the Web.
Web site designers are resigned, at least for now, to the loss of the pop-up window as a tool. "At this point, designers just have to abandon unsolicited pop-ups," said Thomas Brunt, president of OutFront, a site for Web developers.
But even then, they may face other problems. While blockers like Google's are designed to keep out only those pop-ups that were not requested by the user, a few products have the effect of blocking anything that opens in a new browser window. Sites with windows that open after a visitor has clicked on a link are unusable by those who have installed such pop-up blockers.
Franseth and his staff are now busy redesigning the University of Kentucky's Web pages to eliminate pop-up windows - largely by updating them more frequently - while also trying to alert students about the risks of some blocking software. Web developing sites like www.sitepoint.com and Outfront are peppered with chatter about how to cope with the proliferation of blockers.
"I blame the advertisers and porn sites," Franseth said. "It's yet another situation where a perfectly good technology has been rendered useless because someone out there has decided to abuse it."
The New York Times
Monday, November 3, 2003
The Google toolbar, a thin row of buttons and a query window that sits within the Internet Explorer browser, has become a big hit, with millions of people using it each day. Last summer it attracted even more users when Google added a pop-up blocker to the toolbar's features, effectively filtering the unsolicited advertisements that appear along with many Web pages.
"Google Toolbar is great for stopping pop-ups," one user in a public newsgroup wrote last weekend. On the same day, a fan of the toolbar in a forum about free software crowed, "Up to 2,190 pop-ups blocked!" Dozens of similar postings can be found across the Internet.
But Google's blocker and others like it are having unintended consequences for some Web designers. Over the years, growing numbers of Web sites have been designed to include pop-up windows that are not advertising and that users may consider helpful rather than annoying. These legitimate pop-ups - like calendar updates and explanations of new navigation features - enable designers to alert visitors to news without substantially revising the home page.
But today many such pop-ups never see the light of day. "Visitors will load a site that is supposed to have a 'Welcome' message and they won't even know that they missed it," said Greg Franseth, the manager of Web services at the University of Kentucky. Recently, he said, many graduate students at the university failed to learn about a major schedule change that was posted on a departmental Web page "because they didn't get the pop-up."
Google's software is designed to unobtrusively alert users whenever a pop-up is being blocked by flashing a quick starburst of yellow near the user's cursor. It also enables users to tell Google which sites they want to exclude from pop-up restrictions. But, as Google acknowledges, if a person arrives on a page and notices that a pop-up has been blocked, there is no way to retrieve that pop-up to see what was missed.
Solid numbers on how many people have installed pop-up blockers are hard to come by, but in the past year large Internet service providers like America Online and MSN have offered the software to their customers. Dozens of stand-alone software products can be downloaded free, or for a small fee, from the Web.
Web site designers are resigned, at least for now, to the loss of the pop-up window as a tool. "At this point, designers just have to abandon unsolicited pop-ups," said Thomas Brunt, president of OutFront, a site for Web developers.
But even then, they may face other problems. While blockers like Google's are designed to keep out only those pop-ups that were not requested by the user, a few products have the effect of blocking anything that opens in a new browser window. Sites with windows that open after a visitor has clicked on a link are unusable by those who have installed such pop-up blockers.
Franseth and his staff are now busy redesigning the University of Kentucky's Web pages to eliminate pop-up windows - largely by updating them more frequently - while also trying to alert students about the risks of some blocking software. Web developing sites like www.sitepoint.com and Outfront are peppered with chatter about how to cope with the proliferation of blockers.
"I blame the advertisers and porn sites," Franseth said. "It's yet another situation where a perfectly good technology has been rendered useless because someone out there has decided to abuse it."
The New York Times
'nough said
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: Raynes Park
Age: 58
Posts: 1,025
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Javascript pop-ups work ok with Google's toolbar and, imho, are more attention grabbing and less annoying than new windows popping up everywhere - like on any geocities site 
.
Halifax Bank Plc is doing just that at the moment so maybe Mr Franseth needs to take a leaf out of their book... or make his site a little less static...
. Halifax Bank Plc is doing just that at the moment so maybe Mr Franseth needs to take a leaf out of their book... or make his site a little less static...
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: Wet Coast
Posts: 2,335
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
if a person arrives on a page and notices that a pop-up has been blocked, there is no way to retrieve that pop-up to see what was missed.
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: London
Posts: 12
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Over the years, growing numbers of Web sites have been designed to include pop-up windows that are not advertising and that users may consider helpful rather than annoying. These legitimate pop-ups - like calendar updates and explanations of new navigation features - enable designers to alert visitors to news without substantially revising the home page.
Join Date: Jul 2003
Location: Scotland
Posts: 151
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I have been using the google toolbar since it was in beta testing mode and since then I have installed it on many friends, colleagues and customers machines to not one complaint.
I do however find the ever increasing amount of flash pop-ups incredibly annoying, yes there are plugins to stop them but I simply add the offending company to my list of do not purchase from products, I am however running out of companies from which to buy my next car...
I do however find the ever increasing amount of flash pop-ups incredibly annoying, yes there are plugins to stop them but I simply add the offending company to my list of do not purchase from products, I am however running out of companies from which to buy my next car...
Join Date: Jul 2002
Location: edinburgh
Posts: 40
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
peg20, FSD, etc
After thousands of annoying pop-ups, and several instances of aggressive pop-ups (can't close window, make themselves your home page, add themseleves to favourites, etc) I resorted to the following action;
Go into Internet Options. You're looking for the ActiveX controls ok, so Internet Options->Security->Custom level, and there they are. Enable the first, disable the next two, and 'prompt' the next two. 'Ok' it, 'apply' it and get the hell outa there...
But....you need to know this. Your browsing from now on will be a tiny bit different. You will be promted before you can open a website page. You'll spend a nano second doing it for ever more. You will say 'Yes' to 99% of prompts. You will say no to the pop-ups that can now no longer just pop up. You will get used to it. Try it for a day or so.
Hate it? Changing it back is as easy as it was first time
bug
After thousands of annoying pop-ups, and several instances of aggressive pop-ups (can't close window, make themselves your home page, add themseleves to favourites, etc) I resorted to the following action;
Go into Internet Options. You're looking for the ActiveX controls ok, so Internet Options->Security->Custom level, and there they are. Enable the first, disable the next two, and 'prompt' the next two. 'Ok' it, 'apply' it and get the hell outa there...
But....you need to know this. Your browsing from now on will be a tiny bit different. You will be promted before you can open a website page. You'll spend a nano second doing it for ever more. You will say 'Yes' to 99% of prompts. You will say no to the pop-ups that can now no longer just pop up. You will get used to it. Try it for a day or so.
Hate it? Changing it back is as easy as it was first time
bug
Sub Judice Angel Lovegod
Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: London
Posts: 2,456
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
peg20
One example of A "Good pop-up" is of the pop-up calendar variety (either type in the date you are trying to book, or click on the calendar button.)
We have had to redesign this in the light of pop-up blockers.
However, don't get me wrong, I hate pop-up ads as much as anyone else and use Opera, or IE w/ google toolbar.
W
One example of A "Good pop-up" is of the pop-up calendar variety (either type in the date you are trying to book, or click on the calendar button.)
We have had to redesign this in the light of pop-up blockers.
However, don't get me wrong, I hate pop-up ads as much as anyone else and use Opera, or IE w/ google toolbar.
W
I have different 'take 'on sites that are worried by the use of pop-up blockers: Don't use f$%^&ing pop-ups!!!
Ditto javascript & flash for simple bloody menus & site navigation.
Ditto javascript & flash for simple bloody menus & site navigation.
