Need to vent...

Is anyone else getting more and more annoyed by the current web trend of overlaying unrequested items on the stuff I actually want to watch/read?

Seems a million websites now think it's a good idea, once you are on an article of theirs, to gray out the page and push a "Sign up for our newsletter" box into your face. While you are reading.

Youtube does the same, endlessy overlaying channel icons, links, annotations. I just want to watch the damn video.

Cookie warnings are a similar annoyance.

Basically it appears to me the idea that your user has a "flow" he follows is no longer considered valid, or it's just part of business today to break the flow of your users in what they are doing/focusing on. It gets to the point that I just close any site doing that, and those are many.

I don't like it, but grudgingly accept that they have to generate income with their site somehow.

But like virtually all advertising, I don't like it.

Like you I am bothered by the size and intrusiveness of how they are doing it.

A click and they are gone, we are fortunate that we can complain about such irritations.

I am just happy that I was able to click on this forum thread and read it without an auto-starting video loading. It seems like every second webpage I visit these days is trying to load an endless stream of auto-starting videos.

I also simply close the page when a video or overlay tries to load over the text I wanted to read.

And certainly I am aware of the need websites to pay the bills (I can only imagine all those auto-starting videos have some significant bandwidth costs). Some websites I tend to enjoy have put up an overlay asking me to disable my ad blocker. Ok, I generally respect whatever website it may be and am happy to give their ads a shot. But more often than not, trying to show their ads is just ineffective. I disable the blocker on their domain, I whitelist as per their instructions... and still every single page on that website shows the overlay telling me I'm running an ad blocker. Not much more I can do, and if the overlay still won't let me read... well I have to read somewhere else.

Even at the Gas pumps these days. Had never seen one before this past summer while on vacation. Stopped to fill up and started the pump. And all of sudden
a video advertisement started playing on the pump screen. It actually startled me. Even the wife in the car asked what the hell was that.

What JimK said.

In general I'm pretty cheap (still driving a 2008 Honda Element) but I'll pay a little more at the pump at those stations that give me the most pain-free experience (no, I never want a freggin' automated car wash!). Edit: Also, accessibility and if I have to hold the handle the entire time I'm pumping.

What's bothering me now is that YT videos are all 360p minimum, whereas linked videos always had a 144p option. Not good for those of us on satellite. Plus the ads are getting longer and always in higher-def.

It does more than bug me, it worries me. If I'm not familiar with a website and they want to force me to click on something, I usually just close it out. Of course, there's nothing magical about clicking, just mousing over a spot can trigger an event you don't any part of just as easily.
However, even on sites I "trust" it sucks when they don't take tablets into account and there's no way to close it out AT ALL.


On Youtube, you can turn off annotations etc.
Click on your avatar/name in the upper right
Click on the cog next to creator studio to go to Account Settings
Go to PLAYBACK
Uncheck annotations and also captions if you want.

As you can skip after 5 secs the absurd length of some adverts isn't a concern. More annoying is the really obnoxious jangly tone and excessive volume of many.
Some seem to be *trying* to be annoying in 5 seconds or fewer.

Thanks Kryp regards the Youtube tip, but I try to avoid being logged into my Google account.

Of course if they wanted to just make it user friendly they could just set it in a cookie.

Agree regards mobile devices, some of these overlays are unremovable on certain browsers.

Sometimes you're allowed to skip the ad after 5 seconds. Sometimes you are not.



The Jedi Master

I've not yet come across anything other than 5 secs. I'd find another platform if I had to listen to the entirety of some of the Ads every video (but even with 5 secs I often mute the window because I like my ears).

Not all videos with adverts always even play an advert every time.

using a high power ad blocker will disable even youtube ads. you can also reroute the google ads server in your hosts file so that you will never see ads.

agree overlays are very irritating. every website i visit these days asks for me to punch in my email address to sign up to their newsletter. irritating.

Thanks for this. Guess I'll finally have to make a YT account.

No I mean sometimes it says you can click to skip in 5 seconds, other times it says video will play after ad and you don't have the option to skip at all.



The Jedi Master

I do hate the auto running of video and sound. CBS news site is the worst for that. It's annoying how sites like WEBMD make you click thru ten pages to read an article that could have very easily been put on one. But yeah, first world problems.



:

Hypothetical question for all: Try creating and running a website where you put up all of the costs yourself so you don't have to use any ads.


Let me know how it goes.

Can I use H1B visa workers ?

I know it's not what you mean, but if it's a small business site, you can start with something like this or similar...
http://www.verio.com/

I created my own website in FP2000 ($100.00) and even coded my own e-commerce storefront (you had to back then, or use a service). At the time the cost was $50.00/mth for hosting vs. today's $20.00/mth for all the bells and whistles, IIRC.

you can turn the youtube overlays off in the gear icon.

Annotations on-off switch

The worst part about the autoplay videos is the volume. It's always on max and on some sites if the video you're watching is set at say 50% volume it turns it up to 100% and plays the video.

And I believe the reason some sites, the the aforementioned WEBMD, break up what could be a one page article into ten or fifteen is so they get more clicks and ads that can be played.