They ads themselves don't bother me. I don't particularly care for the way they seem to randomly decide when they want to spread out across what you are reading or over links you are trying to click on.

aezarien: That's what I mean. They expand all over everything at random times and cause me to click them when I'm meaning to click something else. It's not just this site, unfortunately they are all over the Internet. I feel like I'm being tricked into visiting a site I don't want to visit... I don't know why they would think that is helpful or effective advertising because generally I don't buy from companies that annoy me.

Well hopefully it will pass like every other annoying design element that has come into fruition since the birth of the internet. Remember all the linear pages with graphic horizontal rules, blinking text, scrolling text, and obnoxious background tiles with huge eye gouging text? Let us not forget the synthesized background music. Then we moved into the frames/no frames, mouse trails era to the dynamic floating flyout menus (gag), entire vertically scrolling paragraphs, and for the sake of everything good in this world.. custom scroll bars.

I think I went a little off subject...

heh.. I'll be happy when they realize that anything that blinks, moves, is obnoxiously designed, makes noise, or does anything other than statically sits there is a turn off to future and current customers alike. The marketing research is there. I just think it is landing on the wrong desks.

Different operating systems handle things differently but on mine at work, if I log in to GW then the ads behave themselves, if I surf the site without logging in then things get obnoxious.

What I hate is when an ad displays a close out "X" and it doesn't close the ad!! or worse it takes you to the main site of the advertiser instead of closing - grrrrrr. Or when they hide the escape or close out button, or design it in a confusing way so that you push the wrong button.... I could go on and on.

I can tell you that I will never never never again respond to any ad or survey here on GW. NEVER. Its a trap. An endless cycle of entrappment that never gives you the option to return to your starting page. I had to completely shut down and relaunch to get back to GW. This is not the way to conduct business.

Thank you both! I'm glad it's not just me.

aezarien: love your history of the web! I totally agree with you.

trianglejohn: I've also ended up at the sponsor site when trying to hit the x to close. It drives me nuts. Heck no, I'm not taking a survey!

I realize the ads are necessary to pay the bills, but when they obscure and interfere with the content of the site, I say enough is enough!

Try using the Firefox browser instead and use their add-on package to block pop ups. Much better.

I agree about the pop-ups, blinking, animated ads. Annoying. I use a pop-up blocker, but still occasionally get the floating survey and I just don't click that space, it will time out and go away.

Being retired from a software company and 30+ years in technology, I've been on all sides of technology from writing code to marketing product management and marketing strategy.

There's so much free stuff that we use on the internet and it's paid for by the advertisers...forums, photo hosting, blog hosting, readers, dashboards, etc. There was a time where we could not have all this free stuff...we'd have to buy it...but there needs to be limits around the advertising. I think Google Ads is doing a good job of this.

I have allowed Google Ads on my blog. I invoke parameters by allowing only text ads and I do my best to "channel" what I will allow by using keywords around gardening. However, the gardening term "iris" can also trigger Lasik surgery ads! The Google bot crawls my blog postings for keywords and places ads according to what I write about. Sometimes I have to avoid certain terms so that I don't get really unrelated ads showing up.

Google terms of agreement specifically state that there shall be no trickery in using their ads.

They do not allow more than 3 sets of ads on a page. A person allowing Google ads doesn't get paid anything for the ads being there..they get a few pennies per click (pay-per-click). No one gets paid until $100 worth of clicks has accumlated. I've been blogging for over 1 1/2 years and have never gotten paid -- so, don't think of it a way to support yourself!

I do what I do (blogging) because I enjoy the gardening community. I allow ads because I'm grateful to have all these free internet tools at my disposal.

Those floating, popping, moving ads that appear here and on many newspapers (the N&O website drives me crazy), are paid advertisers, not pay-per-click. Those animated ads resort to trickery to get accidental clicks. I think that is disgusting. List ads -- okay. But, don't try to trick people.

I think there's hope. Google has bought DoubleClick (an ad agency). Maybe they'll buy even more of the online advertising companies.

Off my soapbox!
Cameron

I use Fire Fox as my browser, too and do not get the ads.

I use FireFox and do not get pop-up ads. The ads I am speaking about are the banner ads that expand on the top and the sides of the pages.

No ads here ever. I use firefox too.

You don't see a banner ad at the top under "iVillage GardenWeb"? There is also a vertical one on the right side of this page. Then, of course, from time to time the "take a survey" thing scrolls by.

I would love it if I didn't see ads. What FF plugin do I need?

Thanks,

Gerri

You don't see a banner ad at the top under "iVillage GardenWeb"? There is also a vertical one on the right side of this page. Then, of course, from time to time the "take a survey" thing scrolls by.

Nope, none of those things. Adblock Plus is the one I have.

Adblock Plus it is then. Thank you!

Gnomey,
Here is a link for firefox.

Here is a link that might be useful: firefox

Yeah i had this issue too. After they came up with the AdBlockplus application for Firefox...I dl'd it and I'm a happy green thumb!

Cameron: I totally missed your post somehow. I'm glad that Google has limits and seems to be reasonable with the advertising. I know what you mean though, for bloggers, it doesn't amount to much - except for the ones that manipulate the system. I've gotten adsense checks twice over the past few years, both times just breaking the $100 threshold.

I love Gardenweb, and intrusive ads or not, I'd always come here. There's just so much knowledge to be had about every aspect of gardening - and it's FREE. So, while i know they've got to pay their bills somehow, and optimally make some cash too, I wish the advertisers would tone it down.

Looks like AdBlock plus does the trick though, so now I can stop complaining!

I was thinking about these annoying animated ads and came up with an analogy.

You wouldn't want billboards jumping out in front of your car when you're driving down the road, so why have ads jump out at you when you're cruising along on the internet!

Cameron

That is a good analogy Cameron! I totally agree.

I've been doing we design since 1997 and one of the foundations of good design is that you don't irritate the user. Not to say that is isn't done all over the place, but when I was first learning, I had it hammered into my head that pages need to load fast, be presented in an appealing way and not offend, harass, annoy, badger, berate or generally irritate the visitors.

One thing about these ads that jump out like that - if they weren't effective, they wouldn't be so widely used. Now, I'm not sure if their effectiveness is measured in clicks or in sales, but if it's clicks - a lot of those are false. Also, since so many people are annoyed by them and the fact that they are tricked into visiting the sponsor, I can't imagine that it has a positive effect on sales.

I'm glad that you guys told me about AdBlock Plus. If more people knew about it and used it, then probably they'd see a decline in the clicks (false and otherwise) and have no choice but to deduce that the ads are ineffective because people hate that kind of thing.

/rant