Slashdot Mirror
Floaters are the New Pop-Ups
windowpain writes "A prior Slashdot article discussed the ever-increasing ability of pop-up ads to break through adblocking software. Now the New York Times (registration required) is reporting that pop-ups are pooped out, replaced by those annoying "floaters" that are even more resistant to conventional pop-up blocking software. From the article: 'Not to be confused with pop-up ads, which open new windows and clutter virtual desktops, these floaters, or overlays, or popovers (no one can agree on a name), can evade the pop-up blockers that many Web browsers have incorporated. In the last year, according to Nielsen/NetRatings, which collects and analyzes data on Web advertising, the frequency of these ads has risen markedly, by almost 32 percent from December 2003 to December 2004, while pop-ups in that period declined by 41 percent.'"
I'm not saying that these ads are evil, but I question the wisdom of forcing ads on people who have taken steps to block them. What does the advertiser expect to accomplish? If their site is struggling so much that the only way they can keep it online is by forcing obnoxious ads on people, the internet would be a better place without them. Make your ads relevant and not super annoying, and maybe people will actually be interested in them.
Not all adverts do have div ID's though, but thankfully we're still well within the realm of being able to use Adblock to nuke them.
The adverts are usually served up by third party advert servers and thus looking at the adblock list of blockable elements... just block all items that are not on the domain for the site you're looking at.
That takes care of 99% of floaters, popups, etc.
The real problem is the next stage of advert evolution, which will be when content providers still use third parties to sell and supply adverts, but start to act as proxies for the adverts.
When content providers are acting as proxies and adverts appear to come from the same domain and content management system as the content... then adverts will be VERY hard to block.
The prevalence of adblock is going to increasingly push companies towards such solutions.
They'll still need to monetise their sites, and whilst it used to be that they didn't care for a minority of people blocking adverts, when that is a fast growing minority and it's affecting their revenues... they will find ways around it.
Just as the DRM rules state that if you can see and hear it you can bypass DRM and copy it... maybe a rule should be created for adverts: If you can see or hear the content, then advertisers CAN find a way to make you see or hear advertisements.
I wonder what it would be like if we worked on stories instead of flashy graphics in games. Would it be better to have a text based game where all the characters had personalities and could hold a conversation? Or is it better having lots of dumb things that don't talk to shoot at?
Enough people don't want to turn off ads, or don't know how, to make this profitable. I've noticed that many ads on TV seem deliberately designed to irritate through stupidity and repetition. Obviously irritation as an advertising strategy actually works with enough people to make it profitable. Consider that many of the people who read slashdot are (or like to think they are) more intelligent than the average person. I don't think the attitude expressed here is indicative of the attitude of the average web-surfer. A poster further down says his users would happily double click on a land-mine just to see what happens. I think that is more indicative of the general attitude of the average web-surfer. As long as there are stupid people, advertisers will cater to them.
Obviously, what we need to do is get rid of all the stupid people. I suggest telling them there is a giant space goat coming to eat the planet and putting them all on some kind of space ark.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
One thing I've noticed though: creative, amusing or artful ads don't work on me.
... don't we?
That's what you think.
Honestly, how do we know we aren't being influenced?
Now you are on the right track. However, there is no spooky, subliminal hypnosis involved. It's just that we are far more susceptible to advertising than we think. Companies advertise for only one reason: it works. New products have uncertain demand, but in established industries it is fairly easy to predict how sales will respond to advertising. Yet nobody thinks they are influenced by ads. Likewise, it is easy to prove that physically attractive political candidates have a material advantage over uglier ones, but while we may be willing to to believe that other voters could be so superficial, we all know that we ourselves are wiser
"The good reader is a rarer swan than the good writer."