OK, I haven’t checked in on ST in several weeks, so may have missed something. But is it just me, or has the forum site been changed to shove annoying pop-up ads in your face? The effect on my system, since I have a couple of pop-up blockers in place, is that I can no longer use the “back” button on my browser to go back to the main forum page. Clicking the back button effectively does nothing because the browser is just going “back” to a pop-up page that my blockers refuse to load.
This is really annoying! Plus it seems to be slowing down page access time. Grrr.
A) Is this just me?
B) Is this old news and there’s already been a pissed-off thread about ST getting invaded by pop-ups? 'Cause if this really is a change in the ST site structure, it does indeed piss me off!
C) Should I be worrying that I have some sort of spyware/virus causing this?
D) Should I just get over it? (but what the frick does “1-800-Flowers” have to do with triathlon??)
No popups here, download adaware or spybot to check for spyware. The ads don’t bug me but if there was a paid version of the site that didn’t include the banners I’d pay for it.
No pop-ups here either. The forum is free for us to use, but not free to maintain. Unless you wish to chip in on the maintenance, ixnay on the pop-up complainingyay.
OK, I should clarify: the “pop-ups” to which I’m referring are actually the lovely little ads now appearing in the banner across the top of the Slowtwitch pages. It seems to be a series of separate little image-ads for 1-800-Flowers— when it succeeds in appearing. When it doesn’t, it shows up as the tell-tale “The page cannot be displayed”, which is the sign that my pop-up blocker is working.
These annoying little pagelets actually generate URL listings in the browser’s history file, which is why clicking “back” for me results in the browser trying to go to a page that the blocker has blocked, so I appear to go “nowhere”.
No pop-ups here either. The forum is free for us to use, but not free to maintain. Unless you wish to chip in on the maintenance, ixnay on the pop-up complainingyay.
Uh I dont get it, Since all add me to it are not getting Pop-ups. its not a ST thing. So why the comment about chipping in and to not discuss it. NO POP UPS ON ST. Just the banner ads.
What browser are you using. FireFox has built in Pop-blockers but is uneffected by these and they do not appear in the history so my back button works fine.
OK, I should clarify: the “pop-ups” to which I’m referring are actually the lovely little ads now appearing in the banner across the top of the Slowtwitch pages. It seems to be a series of separate little image-ads for 1-800-Flowers— when it succeeds in appearing. When it doesn’t, it shows up as the tell-tale “The page cannot be displayed”, which is the sign that my pop-up blocker is working.
These annoying little pagelets actually generate URL listings in the browser’s history file, which is why clicking “back” for me results in the browser trying to go to a page that the blocker has blocked, so I appear to go “nowhere”.
Anyone else noticing this?
Generally pop-up blockers do only that - block pop-ups, which by definition occur in a new browser window.
Not sure why you’re having trouble with the back button - if what you propose were true, you’d have the same trouble on any ad-supported page, most likely. What browser and version are you using? Also - what is your pop-up blocker?
No pop-ups here either. The forum is free for us to use, but not free to maintain. Unless you wish to chip in on the maintenance, ixnay on the pop-up complainingyay.
I don’t mind ads appearing on ST; I get the bill-paying thing, totally on board. But the new “technique” for their appearance (i.e., generating a series of dynamic pagelet-thingies) is a technical annoyance that I don’t recall having experienced on the site before. It’s more intrusive and inhibiting, but I guess if no one else has noticed I’ll just shut up and fuhgeddaboudit!
grumble…
(and yep, have SpySweeper and SpyBot, so am pretty sure it’s not a virus/spyware thingie)
Uh I dont get it, Since all add me to it are not getting Pop-ups. its not a ST thing. So why the comment about chipping in and to not discuss it. NO POP UPS ON ST. Just the banner ads. <<
Huh, I guess you didn’t notice the broken pig-latin so I will throw in a so you see that it was written in jest since you require justification.
To answer your question, the OP asked why the ads were there. I know he is referring to the banner ads. Duh! Done with this.
Generally pop-up blockers do only that - block pop-ups, which by definition occur in a new browser window.
Not sure why you’re having trouble with the back button - if what you propose were true, you’d have the same trouble on any ad-supported page, most likely.
The same thing does indeed happen on the website for my favorite newspaper, but it’s been that way for a long time and I’ve come to “expect” it there. It’s annoying, but I deal with it. Having to deal with the same thing on ST now is new (and exasperating). Like I say: ads are fine, but this new way of displaying them is technically intrusive and deleterious to the site experience.
I’ll have to check with our tech guys to see if there’s a way to eliminate ad URL’s from being retained in the recent history list, that would completely resolve the problem.
Sorry to waste the bandwidth, since no one else seems to have an issue here. My bad!
so you see that it was written in jest since you require justification.