Ok, let me start by saying I think (99% of all) organized boycotts are just dumb and more importantly ineffective. But having said that, there are some products I refuse to buy and websites I refuse to visit as my own little (free market) protest.
I’m not asking anyone to join me, but effective today, I’m boycotting Drudge. There are just too many damn popups. One or 2 is annoying enough but geeze I’m getting them 4 at a time. If I want that, I’ll go to a porn site.
The bottom line: The annoyance of the popups is greater than the worth of the information I get from his site.
I’m a big believer in the free market. At some point if enough other people like me quit visiting then maybe he’ll realized he’s killing the golden goose. If people don’t mind the popups then so be it.
I know I represent about .000000001% of Drudge’s traffic… But that’s how the free market works.
As for me, I’ll go to Lucianne or something.
UPDATE: People keep telling me to run a popup blocker… Please read the extended version of this story… I covered that in the post but many missed it since it is in the extended version.
UPDATE 2: By golly it’s a movement.
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Drudge pissed me off when I noticed that his page regularly refreshes itself without any prompting or changes — presumably boosting his hit counters. Since then, I got no use for the fedora-wearing git.
J.
RE: Jay Tea’s post August 15, 2005 02:36 PM
Drudge pissed me off when I noticed that his page regularly refreshes itself without any prompting or changes…
Proxomitron covers that too. 😉 And it can be run with any browser. As a proxy, it sits between the browser application and the network I/O, so it can edit/filter any code that the browser renders.
Hmmm.
“I use Macs and BSD machines. No Problem.”
Why then are there many commerical anti-virus programs for the Mac and linux?
In effect what you’re relying on, in part, is security through obscurity. The vast majority of computers run Windows, and so the vast majority of viruses are oriented at Windows computers because spending a lot of time to hammer 1% of all computer users, vs 94%+, is a relative waste of time.
*shrug* hey. It’s your ass.
The pop ups are annoying as hell. But funny how nobody seems to care that he hotlinks pretty much every image on his site. Considering the post here a little while back about Kos’s hotlinking situation, I am surprised nobody noticed.
Sigh-
Ed I don’t run linux.
Since you apparently don’t even know enough to know the difference between BSD and Linux, I rather suspect that I can safely ignore any of your advice.
Aaron where have you been? It’s been discussed for years. How else did you know it?
Thanks Mantis! I use proxomitron with firefox and it works fine, but I have to disable proxomitron sometimes to get other sites. Your extension solved the issue for me (at drudge at least)
Paul – Well consider me behind the curve on that one then. To be honest, I learned by right clicking and viewing the pics properties. Another tell-tale sign is that they usually look crappy since he resizes then in the code rather than actaully resizing the file.
Thank you for letting me know that it just wasn’t me. I wasn’t expecting Firefox to fail quite so early (silly me.)
Here’s to the hope that the Firefox folks nip this in the bud.
I hate to disillusion you, but Lucianne has pop-ups, too. I hope you like U of Phoenix.
That said, once you kill the first one, they’re gone. Until you reboot. Doesn’t matter, though, pop-ups and spyware are work of the devil.
Hope Drudge gets the message although I don’t hang out there much. I like the company here and at LGF much better!
One site that I visit on a regular basis was running scripts to beat the popup blockers. So, I had tried a different approach. I contacted 25 companies who listed on the site and advised them that the popup ads were interfering with the ability to view their information. I also advised them that as long as this site ran the popups, I would no longer use that site and thus not see their listings. In addition, I would post on a number of web sites a suggestion that the site be boycotted as long as they ran popups. I reminded these companies that they were paying for listings that were overridden by the popups.
Approximately 3 days later, ALL popup ads had been removed from the site, and to this day, I have not seen another.
kbiel already beat me to it, but the about:config solution for Firefox works beautifully.
That said, I avoid Drudge’s site, as well, but for a different reason: From this web designer’s viewpoint, the site sucks.
RE: TheEnigma’s idea (August 15, 2005 07:18 PM)
The power of persuasion… kudos. That blocking of content argument is pretty compelling.
Pop-ups don’t really bother me all that much, as long as it’s within reasonable limits.
Spyware, on the other hand, drives me nuts. It seems half of the pop-ups at Drudge’s site go to spyware “security” or “Windows Tools” sites.
I think a boycott isn’t good enough. We need to drag Matt naked into the street, paint him blue, burn his fedora, TP his home, and leave him tied – upside down – from a lamppost with a warning that next time we’ll get unpleasant.
Obviously, what with “64 comments” already published, this thread, I’m late…BUT, I use Norton Professional (includes a popup/advertising blocker, among other tools and utilities) and have never seen so much as one popup on DRUDGE, or anywhere else on the internet.
I even have to allow sites such as the BBC — by unique, site-specific, settings — to allow popups such that I can even view an image at a larger size, Norton is so effective. Without that setting (a per-site setting as to what types of popups to allow, because my default for all sites is to allow none), Norton completely prevents all popups, all sites, globally (if that’s what’s selected, as I have done).
I tried other popup blockers and found them bypassed by many sites, including DRUDGE, and was equally peeved about it. Now that I use Norton Professional, I have nearly forgotten the problem even exists.
I agree that DRUDGE should rethink his site advertising methods…no one, and I do mean, NO ONE, likes popups (nor popunders).
That’s why I stopped hitting drudgereport a long time ago. Get clue, all other blogs have no pop-ups.
Just add Drudge to your restricted sites list and the pop ups go away. If a site is listed in the restricted sites list, it won’t execute anything except display the basic HTML, as long as your restricted sites has everything clamped down for options (java, animation, sound, etc etc etc).
He doesn’t have an official RSS feed, but here’s a bootleg one that works quite nicely:
http://bootleg-rss.g-blog.net/d.drudgereport_com-2LG86591VG727145X.php
If Drudge doesn’t like it, he can kiss my… I used to think highly of Drudge, but not anymore. The pop ups are atrocious. I’ve send more than one email to him suggesting he put his ads intermixed with the text headlines, in text, but clearly marking them as ads. The advertisers would get a LOT better exposure and he wouldn’t piss off everyone coming to the site. Duh!
All well. RSS!
Hmmm.
@ Paul
“Ed I don’t run linux.
Since you apparently don’t even know enough to know the difference between BSD and Linux, I rather suspect that I can safely ignore any of your advice.”
Actually I do, but I really didn’t read your post. Multi-tasking is ok for some people, evidently not me.
*shrug* like I wrote before, it’s your ass not mine. As long as you’re happy with what you’ve got, then go for it.
Probably the reason why Drudge Report is able to pop-up ads even if you have a pop-up blocker on is that the ads are being launched using Flash…yep, the same Flash used in web animations.
Fortunately, there’s a way to eliminate this as demonstrated on this site.
Hey try this website. It’s http://www.dilby.com, it’s a non bias news site I stumbled upon. I know there are many Drudge Clones and many come and go, but I’ve been visiting The Dilby Site or the Dilby News Monitor for about 3 months and it stays current and occassionally it breaks stories.
Lata,
Craig
Get Zone Alarm and PestPatrol! Drudge is one of my favorite websites and I don’t even know what the word popup means with these 2 programs. I vist any website and I never get popups. I’ve been popup-free since December 2004, when I got those programs. Nothing can replace them.
Count me in. Joining the boycott and thanks to Dan Sherman I am publishing my own, spyware free Drudge archives on my blog, at the bottem, where he belongs =)