There are many annoying things about computing but one of those things that is most likely to reduce me to screaming at the monitor and firing up Google to hunt down the home addresses of certain programmers is rude software.
Yahoo is a particular offender. Download and install their Yahoo Instant Messenger (or better yet, do not) and you get, unasked for, an icon in the taskbar and two more in Internet Explorer, all without so much as a ‘by your leave’. Install the whole suite of Yahoo products and you get even more. This is ‘interruption marketing’ and contravenes the cardinal rule of ‘do not piss off the customer’. If I wanted the frigging icons taking up my screen real estate, I would have damn well asked for them. So if you find that as intolerable as I do, download Trillian and use Yahoo Instant Messenger’s services without actually having to sully your machine with Yahoo Instant Messenger. Hey Yahoo, my response to you trying to shove your products in front of me? Let’s try “Screw you, I am going to use your more congenial competitor”. I am willing to pay to be treated more to my liking. The same ‘interruption’ ethos can be found all over the internet. The most extreme form is practiced (mostly by porn sites) via complete browser hijacking, persistent pop-up windows and the criminal practice of trying to covertly download diallers and other adware/malware onto your computer. Less extreme but more common are simple intermediate link hijacks. For example if you are a gamer, you might want to check out the well known site Gamespy for up to date news on the subject. But every now and again, you will find yourself confronted not with the Gamespy page whose link you just clicked but rather a bright green page with an advertisement that will eventually release you and send you to where you actually want to go on the site. No doubt Gamespy thinks hijacking some of your valuable eyeball time is a small price to pay for their well informed site.
No, I beg to differ. In fact not just “no” but “get stuffed” is my real reply. If you want to subject me to advertisements, bloody well ask me if I mind first. And my answer will be “No thanks, I mind very much”. Not an option? Fine, then I will take my eyeballs to Worthplaying.com, whose coverage of games is just as good and whose advertisements are far less intrusive.
If popup advertisements and link hijacks do not bother you, all well and good, you see things the way ‘they’ wish we all did. Speaking for myself, my time is far too valuable to waste on information I was not looking for. The internet is filled with many choices and that means there is no need to tolerate that sort of ‘push advertising’ approach. Internet advertising is cheap so the cost of indifference is far lower per pair of eyeballs than, say, a magazine advert. But that is not true if the advertisement has the opposite effect you want. If your company tried that on me, the consequences will be negative value for your money. Not only does interruptive advertising not work on me, it actively makes me your enemy and induces me to spend some of my valuable time to seek out alternative ways to achieve my objectives that will definitely not include you. And I am far from the only one who feels that way… your competitors are only a few clicks away.
Agree 100%. I decided, in a moment of mad abandon, to get a Yahoo email account. Big mistake. It downloaded an entire toolbar that I didn’t ask for, didn’t want, didn’t need and didn’t agree to have, as you say, occupying the real estate of my screen.
Now it even delays opening my computer by telling me it’s searching for Yahoo icons. I deleted my Yahoo email account immediately, but I cannot get rid of their bloody toolbar. There must be a way. Can anyone tell me how to get it off my computer? I will have no further dealings with Yahoo or anything they offer or any company that sponsors them.
Amen!
I think that using Firefox as your browser might help alliviate some of the foolishness that can occur when using larger portal ‘sites and their “tools”. Of course, I don’t use any IM software these days so I could be wrong. After recently purchasing a new laptop for my daughter I did have to spend a fair bit of time disabling all of the junk that comes preinstalled and also correcting some of the default options on her favorite IM programs.
I do wonder how long it will take some of these websites to figure it out, though. It was easy when the revolt was over something as heinous and obvious as pop-up ads. These new ads are the result of that backlash and I’m not sure that enough people are prepared to get as worked up over them again.
If they are not aware of how their customers perceive these invasive ads then they deserve the loss of readership and income that will ultimately occur.
Verity – depending on what Operating System you are using you should just be able to choose it from the list of programs in the control panel-add/remove listing. It doesn’t install like a normal program but I’m pretty sure that it uninstalls like one. If you use IE then you’ve heard it all before, but you might want to consider swithcing to another browser. That’ll fix your Yahoo problem for sure.
Good luck!
What, if anything, is in their brains. Rude software doesn’t only convince me that I would never want to use a product produced by someone who thinks that this is marketing; it makes me wish I could spend the rest of my days plotting the downfall of their business and the murder of their entire blood line.
I’m used to this kind of post on online games sites – people seem to think they have a right to play someone else’s game, or use someone else’s work, for free without popup adverts. Or when a bug doesn’t get fixed within the hour on their free game they rant and rave in all caps. I thought this was down to people who thought free everything was their right, I didn’t expect to see this kind of argument here. You pay Yahoo and Gamespy nothing then have a go at them for providing free content which you seem to feel you have a right to use without giving anything back. Gamespy really don’t care that you’re gone. They’re not a charity. To them, you were just a waste of bandwidth, because you just took from them and gave nothing back. If Samizdata started putting up ads, I’d still come here because I think it’s worth my time coming here. If the ads got so bad that I didn’t think it was worth it, I just wouldn’t come here. I wouldn’t rant about how disgraceful it is that you put ads on your site. Isn’t this after all your private property and yours to do with as you please?
Installing malware is one thing, but this is completely different. It’s like being given a free steak dinner and then demanding to see the manager because the pepper sauce wasn’t quite right. Make use of free alternatives where you can, even encourage others to use them. But there’s no need for this hostility. I don’t think you’d call ITV rude for having adverts. Do we look down on those who let adverts be shown on their private property, and turn over to BBC1?
I also use Firefox, which, apart from being a far superior browser to anything else I have tried, also deals to popups. In fact, I cant remember the last time I experienced an unwanted popup.
Some time ago I also stopped using messenger services altogether, as they were more trouble than they were worth.
The problem in general is annoying in the extreme. I’m sick and tired of software trying to be “helpful” by assuming I want something I dont. I can’t fathom what is going on in the minds of the people who create software like this, except that perhaps they assume that we are all sheep who need to be led to the trough.
P.S.
The easiest way to avoid having your browser highjacked by porn sites is not to go to porn sites. Here endeth the lesson.
Verity, try a combination of Spybot SD 1.3 and the lovely Hijack this. If you want I can mail em to you, neither is hug.
Rich
That should of course say huge.
I’m gonna preview this time.
It is also software that makes you rude to your friends and clients. I’m constantly having to bully uncomprehending people not to use certain well-known applications that are readily hijacked, as insurance that I won’t have to waste hours helping them later.
Rudest sowftware i use is Win98. Left unattended, the memory leaks away, then the OS crashes for want of memory. On rebooting it complains that I haven’t shut it down properly and that I should remember to shutdown properly.
Best example I know of where a software company being intrusive has practically killed itself is Real Networks. Around 2000 they practically owned lock, stock, and barrel the online video segment of the internet. Then they started with the spyware, the pop ups, the near impossiblity of removing the client, and wonder of wonders, people stopped using them!
Quicktime and WMP started eating their lunch, and frankly they deserved it. Now they’ve started toning down the intrusiveness, but it’s probably a case of too little, too late.
http://gaim.sourceforge.net
Free open source software. No ads, fully featured and constantly being improved. Supports AIM, Yahoo, ICQ, IRC, MSN and more. Available for windows and linux users.
My annoyance stems from the incompetence of most popup software. Almost all popup windows load so slowly that I can get my cursor to them and close them before any of the ad actually shows. I never even know what most of them are advertising. So not only is my surfing interrupted, but the advertiser is not getting any message through to potential customers. Pure annoyance.
I wonder if popup advertisers are aware of this?
Gazaridis: It all comes down to how valuable my eyeballs are to me and what value I am offered for them. If Gamespy were offering me enough that I could not get elsewhere for less use of my time on things I do not want, I might be willing to grit my teeth and put up it. They do not, so I take my business elsewhere. If they just asked first I might not be so bothered but they do not. Clearly I am not valuable enough to them and they are not valuable enough to me.
What you miss completely is that interuption like that does not work. It is a myth that tricking someone into looking at something makes them likely to buy things. It is myth that many people have a vested interest in perpetuating (a whole industry in fact) but it is still a myth. The marketing Emperor has no clothes.
Re-read what I wrote. I do not want everything for free, I just want value for value. I have purchased Trillian (not free) beacause Yahoo IM (free) overestimates the value of their software and under estamates the value of my eyeballs and the value I put on my ability to decide what I will look at. It is that simple.
As with all market functions, one is free to walk, with their feet or fingers. The trouble I think is that people are paid by the pop-up whether it is up for a second or a minute. Aggressive advertising and pop-ups aren’t likely to end anytime soon.
There is a spectrum here from blinking advertisements on the margins to malignant ad-ware/spy-ware. When I go to a ‘free’ site with ‘free’ content, I’m aware that is not free and someone is paying to toll which eventually has me looking at the pretty ads. There is, of course, always the pay-site option and the adverts should go away as you pay the toll in cash.
In general, advertising saturates every aspect of life here in the US, and I do my best to avoid commercial television and radio. Unfortunately the biggest backer of sports is not the fan but advertisers. As player salaries have exploded, so has the advertising.
I wonder how long it will be, when access to the internet and cable is spread throughout the class spectrum that people will start defining the haves and have nots by how much advertising they have to be subjected to get content. Some people of means can simply pay for advertising free access while those without have to be subject to advertising. Since certain cable outlets (e.g. ESPN) are being defined by some as a utility of sorts it’s not too far fetched. Equality will be defined by avoidance of advertising.
Last night I had some intrusive programs (Winka.exe and Winupdt.exe) that HiJackThis and AdAware and other anti-spy software couldn’t seem to handle, and found a dandy little application, Pocket KillBox. You need a tiny bit of computer savvy to use it (you have to type or paste in the entire location of the offending file; “c:Program Files…”) but it solved my problem.
What is Yahoo?
Adblock extension for firefox can completely erase adverts from your web experience.
Firefox, adblock, and bugmenot.com are the holy trinity of nice web.
The most interesting thing about this post is Perry’s solution to the problem. He is not crying, “we need legislation to stop the bane of obtrusive Internet advertising!” — the reflex solution of most to all problems of late.
If more people were like Perry, and their reflex solution to problems was, “no thanks, I’ll take my business elsewhere”, the world would be a much more pleasant place.
Incidentally, Google have got their approach to advertising just right: it is as unobtrusive as it gets and is more often than usual *useful* because the adverts displayed depend on what I searched for. Their email service GMail takes the same approach and it works. Google is, I think, the most popular search engine, and GMail likely to become the most popular web mail service. The lessons are clear.
Don McEwan, Thank you. I think it worked, although when I when to My Computer before and tried to disintall Yahoo, it pretended it had disinstalled it, but it was still there … day after day after day …
To other posters, what is Firefox? Is it like Internet Explorer? (Ducks out of range of missiles.) I honestly don’t know. Plse advise.
No, it’s simply better then Internet Explorer. You can read about it and download it from here. Give yourself and hour or so to learn about it. It is not perfect but it is still better.
Does anyone else have a problem with Firefox crashing after reading PDF’s? That is the only bug I’ve seen in the time I have been using it.
Just off topic, my web server tells me that 6% of my sports blog readers are using Firefox, which is just a huge jump. Still a long way to go but the trend is good.
I’ve been using firefox for about a month, and I am enjoying life without popups. So much nicer. No problems to report.
I agree with Perry’s take on the advertising being delivered to you without you permission/consulatation. It’s as if one ordered something delivered from an appliance store, and once they offloaded the appliance, they stayed for a few minutes and erected giant signs on your lawn advertising their other products, then to be sure, slapped their bumper stickers on all sides of your car and the windshields.
As a few of the others, I no longer use IM services. I did use messenger, but it requires me to allow IE Explorer to operate online -which seems to invite browser hijackings and the emplacement of dozens of unwanted icons on my desktop.
There are examples of how to do it right in the ad-supported versions of Eudora and Opera.
Each has an ad panel in the corner of the screen which is not obtrusive but does offer targetted ads. In each case you can pay a license fee and the ad goes away. In each case the makers are happy to disclose to you what information if being collected and give believable assurances that it is not going to be passed to third parties.
To Gazaridis: without claiming to speak for Perry, I don’t mind banner advertisements, and I don’t even mind interstitials that much, providing that I get good value at the end of it. In the days of dial-up this was more of a problem, because the ad would take up a larger share of the available bandwidth, but now it’s not really noticeable.
The problem that I have is with software being installed on my PC that I do not ask for. I don’t expect the free software to be supported to the same level as what I pay for – thought recent comparisons of Mozilla patches vs. Internet Explorer patches are instructive – but I do expect the free software not to go out of its way to anny me by modifying my configuration, adding toolbars, etc. etc.
As ever, for competent and motivated people there is always a way out of the problem situation, but I would really rather not have to eradicate spyware via registry hackery. If a program’s EULA states “to use this program you must agree to use its toolbar” I will take a good look at the functionalities of the toolbar and probably not install the program. The GNU world can provide any software that users require, for free, in a dozen different permutations and a hundred different graphical interfaces.
As Perry says, if a program sneaks annoyances onto MY system, I will not only uninstall it immediately, I will not consider its successor or any of its parent company’s other products. This is not the same as showing me a banner ad – the distinction is whose property the advertising appears on.
Finally under XP SP2 someone has decided to introduce a pop-up blocker to Internet Explorer … about 5 years too bloody late IMO.
If you do need to use Internet Explorer instead of Firefox, Opera etc. it is worthwhile going to Tools > Internet Options, clicking on the Advanced tab and then unchecking ‘Enable third-party browser extensions (requires restart)’ and then relaunch IE – this disables the Yahoo bar, the Google bar (some versions could cause IE to crash), the Norton Antivirus bar and a clutch of others.
Gotta chip in with Gazaridis. Of course, Perry has the right to choose something else but that’s a whole lot of complaining for something that is free.
I’m going to go further and bat for the evil Yahoo. For nothing, they give you:
— a 100 MB email account that you can keep when you change ISPs, jobs, whatever — a great additional account, if nothing else.
— Web based access to your other POP accounts
— FREE IM with voice, webcam and text. Our company has offices in Ireland, USA and UK and we all use Yahoo.
— Ahem, I’m sorry you didn’t like the tool bar, Verity, but it blocks pop-ups, provides your bookmarks on every computer you get on and has some handy features. Yahoo does ask if you want it installed before proceeding (though I know it’s easy to miss those things in an install)
— I use several computers; Yahoo syncs my address book between all of them and even my PDA. That used to be a real problem.
All free. $20 a year (a year) you get a 2GB mail account, POP access and web access to send and receive from all your accounts.
I wish the stuff I paid real money for (web hosting, ISP, mobile access) provided a fraction of the value.
Yahoooooooo!
“Does anyone else have a problem with Firefox crashing after reading PDF’s? ”
I read a fair amount of PDF’s and I havent had that problem as yet.
You only have to go to “view” then “toolbars” to remove a toolbar whats the fuss about?
This is true Geoffry, but the problem is that is rather like saying “but the graffiti I sprayed on your wall uses washable paint, so you can just wipe it off! What is the big deal?”
Sure, but it is my wall and you didn’t make it clear to me what you intending to do when I invited you onto my property in the first place!
My desktop is not there for companies to rearrange for their convenience and if they do so, not only will I not use their products, they have actively made me their enemy, which is not generally the desired outcome for most marketing. It may not bother you but you are quite wrong if you think I am the only ‘prosumer’ out there to whom it matters a great deal.