I find dictionary.com to be a very handy resource. But boy are their ads annoying. And it looks like they’ve gone that extra mile to get their popup ads to dodge around Firefox and IE+Google Toolbar’s popup defences. (At least I assume it’s them, not some other site with popups sitting in the background).
Not to mention the fact that the popup ads are the worst kind – the ones that look to people of limited computer-literacy like legitimate system messages, for instance:
Oh sure, they have “advertisement” written in tiny tiny greyed writing in the corner. That makes it all better, doesn’t it. I wonder if Cancel actually closes it? (I clicked the X in the corner.)
That’s odd Daniel, my Firefox 1.0 blocks the pop up on dictionary.com no problems.
The pop-up or banner ads that look like Windows alert boxes on default settings are amusing, as I am on a Mac so they can’t possibly be genuine. The oversize pointers and spinning, jerking, flashing eggtimer symbols are also particularly irritating.
If people are using this ‘tactic’ perhaps they will check the OS of the visitor’s computer first, and serve up ads appropriate to that system.