IE To Block Pop-Ups

smd4985 writes "Next year MS will release a XP service pack that enables IE to block pop-up ads. Only a few years late. Maybe Mozilla.org/Opera should patent the technology to make it hard for Bill 'embrace and extend' Gates to kill those XCam ads...."

Comments

Proxomitron?

[Empiric]

What's the point? Among others, Proxomitron is free, takes 5 minutes to set up, and is massively configurable for popup/banner/script/etc. blocking.

The strange thing here for me is why Microsoft would do this from a business perspective. I would think they're drawing a fair amount of income from their MSN portal advertising. Maybe it doesn't work for MSN? Or they're only blocking popups because the don't plan on having them on a MSN linked site anyway?

Re:Proxomitron?

[invisik]

Somebody said to me the other day they wanted to switch off of their local ISP DSL to Earthlink DSL because it had pop-up blocking.

Enough said.

-m

Re:Proxomitron?

[Junior J. Junior III]

Sadly, Proxomitron is no longer being supported or developed. I wish it weren't so, I liked it a lot. But, there's always privoxy.

Bad for users of alternative browsers?

[Spleener12]

The thing is, before now companies who did the pop-up thing didn't bother figuring out how to get around existing pop-up blockers because the browsers that had them are not remotely in the majority, and I'll bet that there isn't a terribly significant percentage using separate pop-up blockers, either- kinda like how Mac/Linux users are mostly safe from viruses because most viruses are designed for Windows because most people use Windows. If pop-up blocking is integrated into the browser that 90% of the web-surfing population is using, you can bet that they'll start figuring out how to get around it- or worse, figure out some more annoying method of advertising. Either way, us Mozilla(Firebird)/Opera users might get screwed along with the IE users.

Or they'll just exploit one of IE's 40 billion security holes to get the pop-ups through and everyone else will be just fine.

Re:Bad for users of alternative browsers?

[Saeger]

or worse, figure out some more annoying method of advertising.

The absolute worst kind of advertising, IMNSHO, is stealth marketing (aka: viral marketing). It's not as overtly annoying, but it makes my skin crawl and my blood boil to know that the growth of "subertising" is inevitable - the only defense being trust networks, which aren't really used well yet.

Right now, the only thing that gets through my adfilter (privoxy) are stealth shills and those floating DHTML ads (like this one). I'm sure if this trend continues these will be filtered out by default as well.

--

Prediction

[Davak]

Soon pop-up ad companies will be hiring lawyers to attack Microsoft for blocking ads...

Who do we cheer for then? (grin)

Davak

Re:Prediction

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

"Calling people idiots is not only extremely rude, but very counterproductiv"

It is, however, extremely accurate, in the case of joe "sure-I'll-install-flash-oh-my-god-what-is-that-on -my-screen"

Don't understand how the thing you're using works? Don't care to learn? that would make you an idiot. (not the poster I'm replying to, but rather Al the AOL user)

Personally I don't give a shit if some mouth-breathing, inbred dipshit is offended because I won't tolerate his ignorance.

Who the fuck are you to tell the person you're responding to to shut up, anyhow? You think he's arrogant? look at yourself.

Re:Prediction

[GregWebb]

As a web application programmer, yes, users of complex web apps benefit significantly from JavaScript because it means we can write interfaces that allow the sort of complexity you need to do some of the bigger jobs without having whole hosts of different screens to click through.

About patenting

[Ataru]

My memory is no doubt shorter than it should be (probably da weed) but I don't remember Microsoft EVER having a go at someone over a patent issue. As far as I know they use patents only defensively. I would be genuinely interested if anyone could come up with a counterexample. Anyone?

One down..

[Kjeks]

So now they just lack tabbed browsing, type ahead/fast search, better text zooming on fixed-size text, real PNG support and the rest of the "to-do list".

Re:Vote with money

[BrokenHalo]

Or, MS just uses the same "Allow requested popups" option that Opera has.

Or have a preference, like Mozilla for sites allowed to send popups. There are few sites where I'm prepared to put up with popups, and only if I feel that I really want to buy something. The "allow requested popups" feature in Opera is not that useful to me, since 99% of sites don't warn you that's what they're going to do, so you have no way of distinguishing between a popup that has been requested or otherwise.

IE may already have tabbed browsing

[SonicBurst]

I subscribe to MS technet, which contains a shitload of content, indexed on a CD. The interface used to navigate the index is nothing more than a front for IE (all of the index content is pretty standard HTML stuff). One thing I just noticed the other day is that if I open more than one item, it opens them a tabbed interface. Perhaps this is a special function of the interface, but like I said, it really isn't anything more than a framework for IE, so if they can do it there, why not in mainstream IE? Hell, for all I know, us technet subscribers are beta testing the tabs!

Will Microsoft act like the phone companies?

[DrDebug]

You know, where the phone companies sell their (home) customers services to block telemarketers, and then turn around and sell the telemarketers methods on how to get around those blocks?

Perhaps Microsoft will sell Pop-up advertisers a way to get around the new IE pop-up blocking software.

Hey, it's just another revenue stream!!

Re:Bad news

[red floyd]

here are a number of free utilities to block popups in IE that work well, but AFAIK, none can block Flash animations

Then use Mozilla Phoenix. And download the "click to play flash" extension.

Re:Not entirely...

[Zaiff Urgulbunger]

I think this happens when the page hasn't finished loading and you click the link. Moz seems to just stop new windows being opened whilst the page is being loaded, but once it has completed loading, then new windows are A-Okay.

..which is maybe not the best implementation, but I still like Moz.

losing selling point for MSN

[SethJohnson]

One thing I haven't seen a lot of discussion of is why MS hasn't stepped forward to do anything about popups and spam before this. Enjoying their monopoly in the OS arena, they've established a browser monopoly and have no competitive pressure to improve their browser. IE users have been subjected to torturous popup ads for a few years now. If you examine any of the MSN marketing materials (intentional alliteration), you'll see that they tout popup blocking as one of the advantages to their service.

If the company would improve its browser, they would have one less 'feature' in their MSN service.

Clear example of monopoly exploitation in one product (browser) to gain an advantage in another area (ISP service). Sure, every other ISP is offering pop-up blocking, but let's see how they implement this service patch. Wouldn't it be interesting if it sort of half-works, but is 100% effective for MSN users?

ms hype

[edstromp]

With the delay in longhorn, why can't microsoft just wait to announce features till they are actually close? Say 3 months ahead of the release?

I'm so sick of hearing about new MS features for this or that only to find that they won't be available till 2006.

Re:Wow!!!

[RoLi]

The sad fact is that Microsoft has to lose more than to gain by fixing png and css problems.

If sites begin to use these features more, people with have to upgrade and when they upgrade, there is of course the danger that they move away from IE.

Microsoft is quite happy with the status quo and will do anything to defend it.

Re:This is funny

[laird]

"It will accelerate the arms race between marketroids and Internet users"

This is certainly true. That being said, in the mass market right now the "marketroids" are the only ones fighting the war right now -- IE users are all on the receiving end of so much advertising that the general internet is all but useless. Sure, the advertisers will find new ways to abuse internet users, but that was going to happen anyway.

One side effect, though, will be that those of us using web browsers that have blocked pop-ups forever may be vulnerable to the next bit of advertising. But I'm confident that our browsers can move faster than IE...