4 ms·

BBC hijacks the back button? Weird choice, that.

by purephase 6y ago

CodesInChaos 6y ago
It's redirects international visitors to bbc.com
- ChrisKnott 6y ago
  I think it's because they have ads internationally but aren't allowed to have ads in the UK
  - emayljames 6y ago
    You have to wonder why that was a choice, when they could serve/not serve ads based on location, instead of hard redirecting.
    - jayflux 6y ago
      SEO mainly. They prefer to use .com for international stuff and keep uk users on .co.uk
    - wmil 6y ago
      Could be a legal issue. If they have a legal requirement to not serve ads in the UK it's good to have a clean separation where they can see if the redirect is broken.
- matham 6y ago
  This is very annoying. I sometimes want to see how BBC is covering events from a UK perspective, but it always redirects to bbc.com. I could switch my VPN to UK, but it never seems worth the effort.
  - GoblinSlayer 6y ago
    Looks like it's a script that redirects. I have noscript and scripts are disabled by default and the site doesn't redirect me.
  - beermonster 6y ago
    It’s interesting to compare bbc.com vs bbc.co.uk reporting. You should try it for a month or two and see what you think.
- Kaze404 6y ago
  It works for me
aqme28 6y ago
Seems like they're redirecting me from bbc.co.uk to bbc.com with history, so the back button only changes my country unless I hit it fast enough.
- bovine3dom 6y ago
  I wonder why they don't use `location.replace` [1]. It isn't exactly new. Edit: ah, I see, it doesn't work for changing domains. Still, they could use e.g. bbc.co.uk/[country-code]/ as many other sites do. [1]: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Location/replace https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Location/re...
  - GoblinSlayer 6y ago
    Redirection is often erroneous, then destroying the history exacerbates the error. Data destruction is an antifeature, really.
    - bovine3dom 6y ago
      I see where you're coming from, but having to press back twice quickly to get back to the page I actually came from is very annoying. It's essentially impossible on mobile. Perhaps browsers should disable redirection on pages that have been reached via the back button? That could add a lot of complexity.
      - roryokane 6y ago
        In Firefox for Android, I can press and hold on the Back button in the '…' menu (not Android's Back button) to show the current Rab's history as a list. By touching an old history entry, I can navigate directly to it, skipping any redirects.

BBC hijacks the back button? Weird choice, that.

CodesInChaos 6y ago

It's redirects international visitors to bbc.com

ChrisKnott 6y ago
I think it's because they have ads internationally but aren't allowed to have ads in the UK
- emayljames 6y ago
  You have to wonder why that was a choice, when they could serve/not serve ads based on location, instead of hard redirecting.
  - jayflux 6y ago
    SEO mainly. They prefer to use .com for international stuff and keep uk users on .co.uk
  - wmil 6y ago
    Could be a legal issue. If they have a legal requirement to not serve ads in the UK it's good to have a clean separation where they can see if the redirect is broken.
matham 6y ago
This is very annoying. I sometimes want to see how BBC is covering events from a UK perspective, but it always redirects to bbc.com. I could switch my VPN to UK, but it never seems worth the effort.
- GoblinSlayer 6y ago
  Looks like it's a script that redirects. I have noscript and scripts are disabled by default and the site doesn't redirect me.
- beermonster 6y ago
  It’s interesting to compare bbc.com vs bbc.co.uk reporting. You should try it for a month or two and see what you think.
Kaze404 6y ago
It works for me

aqme28 6y ago

Seems like they're redirecting me from bbc.co.uk to bbc.com with history, so the back button only changes my country unless I hit it fast enough.

bovine3dom 6y ago
I wonder why they don't use `location.replace` [1]. It isn't exactly new. Edit: ah, I see, it doesn't work for changing domains. Still, they could use e.g. bbc.co.uk/[country-code]/ as many other sites do. [1]: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Location/replace https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Location/re...
- GoblinSlayer 6y ago
  Redirection is often erroneous, then destroying the history exacerbates the error. Data destruction is an antifeature, really.
  - bovine3dom 6y ago
    I see where you're coming from, but having to press back twice quickly to get back to the page I actually came from is very annoying. It's essentially impossible on mobile. Perhaps browsers should disable redirection on pages that have been reached via the back button? That could add a lot of complexity.
    - roryokane 6y ago
      In Firefox for Android, I can press and hold on the Back button in the '…' menu (not Android's Back button) to show the current Rab's history as a list. By touching an old history entry, I can navigate directly to it, skipping any redirects.