In the beginning, man created the internet. He connected computers through cables, and later the airwaves, that were at a considerable distance from each other, and gave them language so they could communicate, share information, and grow. And man saw that it was good.
But soon enough, annoying things started sneaking into the idyllic world of the great online. Internet advertising was invented, and this led to the appearance of the first annoying thing: the blinking banner.
Soon enough, more annoying inventions snuck into the paradisiacal world of the internet: pop-ups, overlays, all-caps, and entitled individuals shouting their point of view through the airwaves. Even though the majority has fought to have them disappeared, the annoying things keep popping out of nowhere, turning an otherwise informative and enjoyable experience – browsing the web – into a chain of annoyances and disappointments.
Here is a list of the most annoying things one can stumble upon online in the summer of 2017.
Apps
There are many blogs and other publications constantly nagging us about how we should download and install their apps. Why should we do that? If such a complex thing as https://www.royalvegascasino.com/getting-started/mobile/ can make do without a native app, why should we install an app for reading the news of one specific website – especially when we can easily do so using a news reader? The Royal Vegas Mobile is the perfect example for a fully functional web app. It has games, security, and privacy, all of them done right. The games at the Royal Vegas Mobile work perfectly inside a web browser… and if we want a shortcut on our home screen to it, we can easily place one there.
Apps make it easier for publications to feed us news and to scream for our attention using another annoying thing that’s becoming widespread today:
Push notifications
An ever-increasing number of websites, desktop and otherwise, want to send us notifications whenever they add new content. For many of us, this is an unashamed disregard of the right to choose WHAT we want to read and WHEN we want to read it. Isn’t it enough for us to handle all the emails, updates, alerts, notifications, and special offers on our smartphones, do we have to get them on our desktop computers, too?
“Subrscibe” overlays
If you thought overlays were a thing of the past, you might want to reconsider. Instead of ad banners, now we have overlays trying to convince us to subscribe to their newsletter. That wouldn’t be a big issue – after all, we WILL subscribe to the publications that are of interest to us. What makes it an annoyance is that these overlays don’t appear right away – they will wait anywhere between 30 seconds and 3 minutes to show up. As if they could bully us into subscribing this way.
Anti-Ad-Blocker overlays
I know, ad blockers are a nuisance – they rob publishers of the possibility to generate ad revenue and keep up the good work. Yet these publishers often fall into the extremes – they don’t even let you decide if they deserve the support of the reader. Some of them are so desperate that they will fill their website with ads – overlays, Infolinks, and other annoying stuff – that makes enjoying the website impossible. And they are usually the most vocal against ad blockers – even though the content they publish is trash.
A message to these webmasters: you can convince us to watch (click) your ads if you offer quality content in return. But please, let us see the content first and decide whether we like it or not before nagging us about turning off our ad blockers. Otherwise, the chances of us becoming returning visitors are nil.
Auto play
Last but not least, here is something that should be punishable by hanging by the testicles: auto-playing videos and audio streams embedded into websites. Think of how great it feels to navigate the endless ocean of the web with your favorite music playing in the background, only to be interrupted by a voice or another – far louder – voice, out of nowhere. Aside from being an annoyance – especially if you don’t find the “mute” or “stop” button right away – it can scare the living soul out of you.
Back in the day, websites had background music. We hardly managed to get rid of that – and now we have this. It’s a shame.