4 ms·

Good work from Mozilla, but it won't help prevent those sites that pop up a HTML modal asking you to subscribe by email AND then a few seconds later pop up anot

by amanzi 8y ago

Good work from Mozilla, but it won't help prevent those sites that pop up a HTML modal asking you to subscribe by email AND then a few seconds later pop up another HTML modal asking to send you notifications to keep you up to date AND then sliding in something from the bottom with "relevant" posts AND maybe also slide something else in from the top or sides with some other thing that just ends up blocking the content you're actually interested in reading....

endgame 8y ago
I love the satirical version of this bullshit that http://n-gate.com/ http://n-gate.com/ uses.
josephg 8y ago
I opened a medium post the other day from my phone that did all this stuff. It was amazing - there was a bar up the top asking me to install the medium app. Then another bar below that asking me to subscribe to the author or something. Then a call-to-action pop-over on the bottom of the screen asking me to join a mailing list or something. Only about 1/4 of my phone screen was left displaying the content - which wasn't even enough space to see the post's title on my plus sized phone. I closed the tab, because who has time for that? I can never tell if websites don't know how many people get turned away by how awful their websites are, or if they know but figure its a good deal. (Maybe medium figures an X% drop in blog engagement is worth it if a few readers join their mailing list). In the meantime I'd like it if all browsers added an option to automatically block all website notification requests. Firefox does this, and its great.
- lugg 8y ago
  Fyi, you might like, Firefox + ublock + annoyances list on mobile fix most of this garbage.
  - ttctciyf 8y ago
    What is "annoyances list" ? EDIT: Oh, right, inside the ublock options.
    - detaro 8y ago
      A filter list targeted at removing annoyances. There's a few around, https://github.com/yourduskquibbles/webannoyances https://github.com/yourduskquibbles/webannoyances is a popular example.
      - ttctciyf 8y ago
        Right, I found a couple inside the "3rd party" tab in ublock. This is great! Thanks.
        gorhill 8y ago
        "'3rd party' tab"? What is your version of uBlock Origin? That tab was renamed "Filter lists" a long, long time ago.
- luckylion 8y ago
  > I can never tell if websites don't know how many people get turned away by how awful their websites are, or if they know but figure its a good deal. Having been told to implement aggressive exit-intent overlays on sites: I'm pretty sure it's the latter. A substantial amount of people don't bounce if you throw an annoying "do you really not want to know this secret?" overlay at them with an option saying something like "OK YES I WANT TO KNOW". I hate sites that do it, but for most sites, it's not tech-adept power users that make up the audience.
  - peteretep 8y ago
    My favourite thing about using 1Password to store my credit-card details is the number of times I've gone to pay, started moving my mouse to the 1Password button, and the exit-intent fires and gives me a discount I wasn't expecting.
- dreamcompiler 8y ago
  Back in the 80s I used to read Texas Monthly magazine. It had a lot of good writing (still does). But I had to quit when they started putting the table of contents after 30 pages of ads. Worse, every issue contained 2 or 3 scratch-and-sniff perfume samples that made the magazine reek like a bordello. We're kind of at that stage with the web now. There's no perfume (yet) but there are auto-play videos. (Thank you Mozilla for fixing these.)
luckylion 8y ago
Imho only Google can solve that. Give sites that do non-interaction overlays -100 and it will be a thing of the past.
kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
NoScript fixes a lot of this crap. If you want to deal with less breakage you can use the uB:Origin element zapper to remove annoying overlays.
anonymousab 8y ago
I've found that the "Kill Sticky" bookmarklet works wonders for obliterating most of these in a single click.
dreamcompiler 8y ago
Don't forget the chatbot. "Wouldn't you like to ask me a question?" in a modal dialog that covers 25% of (what's left of) the content. No. I don't want to ask you a question. You're a robot in the uncanny valley of English, and you're annoying me. Thank goodness for the Kill Sticky bookmarklet. I could not surf without it nowadays.
Vinnl 8y ago
I'm not sure if they're still actively working on it, but Mozilla at least intended to find a way to block those as well: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/in-page-pop-up-reporter/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/in-page-pop-u...
Double_a_92 8y ago
I just close the whole tab and never visit again if that happens...
TorKlingberg 8y ago
I don' think Mozilla can stop terrible websites from being terrible. You'll just have to visit better websites.
veddox 8y ago
A couple of weeks ago I had a site that simultaneously showed me an extra-wide cookie bar, a notification request, and a greyed out screen with a half-screen "Disable Adblocker" request. That was two-thirds of my entire laptop screen devoted to popups I didn't want!

by amanzi 8y ago

endgame 8y ago

I love the satirical version of this bullshit that http://n-gate.com/ http://n-gate.com/ uses.

josephg 8y ago

I opened a medium post the other day from my phone that did all this stuff. It was amazing - there was a bar up the top asking me to install the medium app. Then another bar below that asking me to subscribe to the author or something. Then a call-to-action pop-over on the bottom of the screen asking me to join a mailing list or something. Only about 1/4 of my phone screen was left displaying the content - which wasn't even enough space to see the post's title on my plus sized phone. I closed the tab, because who has time for that? I can never tell if websites don't know how many people get turned away by how awful their websites are, or if they know but figure its a good deal. (Maybe medium figures an X% drop in blog engagement is worth it if a few readers join their mailing list). In the meantime I'd like it if all browsers added an option to automatically block all website notification requests. Firefox does this, and its great.

lugg 8y ago
Fyi, you might like, Firefox + ublock + annoyances list on mobile fix most of this garbage.
- ttctciyf 8y ago
  What is "annoyances list" ? EDIT: Oh, right, inside the ublock options.
  - detaro 8y ago
    A filter list targeted at removing annoyances. There's a few around, https://github.com/yourduskquibbles/webannoyances https://github.com/yourduskquibbles/webannoyances is a popular example.
    - ttctciyf 8y ago
      Right, I found a couple inside the "3rd party" tab in ublock. This is great! Thanks.
      - gorhill 8y ago
        "'3rd party' tab"? What is your version of uBlock Origin? That tab was renamed "Filter lists" a long, long time ago.
luckylion 8y ago
> I can never tell if websites don't know how many people get turned away by how awful their websites are, or if they know but figure its a good deal. Having been told to implement aggressive exit-intent overlays on sites: I'm pretty sure it's the latter. A substantial amount of people don't bounce if you throw an annoying "do you really not want to know this secret?" overlay at them with an option saying something like "OK YES I WANT TO KNOW". I hate sites that do it, but for most sites, it's not tech-adept power users that make up the audience.
- peteretep 8y ago
  My favourite thing about using 1Password to store my credit-card details is the number of times I've gone to pay, started moving my mouse to the 1Password button, and the exit-intent fires and gives me a discount I wasn't expecting.
dreamcompiler 8y ago
Back in the 80s I used to read Texas Monthly magazine. It had a lot of good writing (still does). But I had to quit when they started putting the table of contents after 30 pages of ads. Worse, every issue contained 2 or 3 scratch-and-sniff perfume samples that made the magazine reek like a bordello. We're kind of at that stage with the web now. There's no perfume (yet) but there are auto-play videos. (Thank you Mozilla for fixing these.)

luckylion 8y ago

Imho only Google can solve that. Give sites that do non-interaction overlays -100 and it will be a thing of the past.

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago

NoScript fixes a lot of this crap. If you want to deal with less breakage you can use the uB:Origin element zapper to remove annoying overlays.

anonymousab 8y ago

I've found that the "Kill Sticky" bookmarklet works wonders for obliterating most of these in a single click.

dreamcompiler 8y ago

Don't forget the chatbot. "Wouldn't you like to ask me a question?" in a modal dialog that covers 25% of (what's left of) the content. No. I don't want to ask you a question. You're a robot in the uncanny valley of English, and you're annoying me. Thank goodness for the Kill Sticky bookmarklet. I could not surf without it nowadays.

Vinnl 8y ago

I'm not sure if they're still actively working on it, but Mozilla at least intended to find a way to block those as well: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/in-page-pop-up-reporter/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/in-page-pop-u...

Double_a_92 8y ago

I just close the whole tab and never visit again if that happens...

TorKlingberg 8y ago

I don' think Mozilla can stop terrible websites from being terrible. You'll just have to visit better websites.

veddox 8y ago

A couple of weeks ago I had a site that simultaneously showed me an extra-wide cookie bar, a notification request, and a greyed out screen with a half-screen "Disable Adblocker" request. That was two-thirds of my entire laptop screen devoted to popups I didn't want!