IGN Advertising is Evil

[fuzzyslug]

Ok, I'm not normally one to pile on IGN -- in fact, I have a subscription to the site -- but this has to be one of the worst forms of advertising I've ever seen.

http://sports.ign.com/articles/575/575615p1.html

Look through the article and you are sure to find some completely useless links. They simply point back to the original article on NBA Street 3. Hover over the links and get a nasty, evil surprise in the form of tooltip advertising you never knew you wanted (because you didn't).

Arghh. Wasting my time with this shit will make me cancel my subscription in a hurry. Is this showing up on its sister site, Gamespy as well?

By the way, this complete waste of the reader's time is called IntelliTXT (http://ign.us.intellitxt.com/whatisIntelliTXT.asp?ipid=553&cc=us). Evil has a name.

[nutsak]

That crap has been poping up on other sites as well. Go have a look at some threads on halflife2.net 's forums and you'll see it in actual posts which makes it super annoying.

[DaveC]

By the way, this complete waste of the reader's time is called IntelliTXT (http://ign.us.intellitxt.com/whatisIntelliTXT.asp?ipid=553&cc=us). Evil has a name.

I've tried to block IntelliTXT but no luck do far.

[BobJustBob]

I've successfully blocked intellitxt using Firefox's adblock. I believe it was just *intellitxt*, but as I'm not on my home machine I can't be sure.

[mono]

Thanks BobJustBob, blocking http://*intellitxt* worked for me too.

[ChrisGrenard]

Thanks BobJustBob, blocking http://*intellitxt* worked for me too.

Ah, thankee! Worked like a charm! Hey, as a side note, you know those pages they redirect you to sometimes before showing you the article? Any way to kill those off?

[chet]

The ads between, interstitials, I can handle. But the text within an article as an ad is just breaking a fundemental idea of the web. I hate that shit. In ie the links look different, but in firefox, they just look like regular links. Either way they stink.

Odd thing is, those ads pay like shit, but some people are desperate to squeeze every penny out of every page.

Chet

[hanji]

I would like to block that stuff too but I seem to be blind today as I can't locate where to block stuff in FireFox, someone feel like directing me to where I can do that please?

[GMicek]

IGN has been using them for some time now, and they've never really bothered me. There's some spyware out there that will do the same thing on all pages you go to, so if, for example, you're reading QT3 everytime the word "book" or "dvd" shows up it will link it to Amazon or something.

Strangely enough these types of ads (IGN ones as well) don't work in my primary browser (Opera).

[andrew_fm]

Once they mentioned "Black and White" and it auto-linked to some absolutely darling dishware on Target.com.

[Tyrion Lannister]

I would like to block that stuff too but I seem to be blind today as I can't locate where to block stuff in FireFox, someone feel like directing me to where I can do that please?

adblock (http://adblock.mozdev.org)

[fuzzyslug]

Thanks BobJustBob, blocking http://*intellitxt* worked for me too.

Thank you sir. This did the trick wonderfully.

This form of advertising still sucks, though, just for the record. Thankfully, it was easy to defeat.

[Gladguy]

I <3 Firefox.

[Jupiter Jones]

If you don't like the ads, don't go to IGN sites. I think they have every right to advertise the crap out of their content if they please, and you have every right to block it. The thing that irks me the most is that legitimate tools that web developers use (i.e. pop-up windows) are blocked because people can't stand having to "pay" (by looking at ads) for something...

[Derek Meister]

Shouldn't you be mad at those web developers who've abused the pop-up (and pop-under) to the point where end-users are fed up enough to go out of their way to block them?

When you've got average people searching out pop-up blockers, it's a serious problem, because the average person tends to leave their installs the same way it was when they first bought their computer. For them to bother to go into that strange land of installing extra software, or going into their browser's options or config menu, that's a sure sign that it's not just a mere inconvenience, but an extreme annoyance.

Besides, it's not like most pop-up blocking software doesn't provide an easily clickable button to unblock an legitimate pop-up windows.

It's not that most people don't want to "pay", most of us don't mind reasonable banner adverts or sidebars, but being assaulted by pop-ups or ads breaking up the text really make reading the content of a site unbearable to the point where we will be motivated to block all of them.

[fuzzyslug]

If you don't like the ads, don't go to IGN sites. I think they have every right to advertise the crap out of their content if they please, and you have every right to block it. The thing that irks me the most is that legitimate tools that web developers use (i.e. pop-up windows) are blocked because people can't stand having to "pay" (by looking at ads) for something...

I will likely very much follow this suggestion.

That said, a healthy limit to your advertising is very helpful to both producer and customer alike. This particular brand of advertising is worse than a banner on the side or even a pop-up. This integrates tightly with content and makes something intuitive and useful, a hyperlink, something useless and irritating. Why do I need to link back to the original content? That serves no purpose. It's only made a hyperlink so that I move my mouse and attention to it. When this attention and focus is badly used, I lose faith in the very content I'm reading. As a developer that focuses on GUI issues, I'm offended.

On a separate note, I do pay for this content -- I mentioned that I have a subscription to IGN. I remember why I like Gamespot, and their lack of ads when you pony up, so much.

[Thrrrpptt!]

It's really absurd that you don't get to disable ads on IGN when subscribing. I know they can do whatever they want, but it seems like they're missing a huge opportunity, especially given how obnoxious the ads are.

[Tom McNamara]

We eds aren't particularly fond of the green intellitext links either. They're inserted dynamically. Meaning that editorial has nothing to do with it, for what that's worth.

As it turns out, the two blue links in the article do not point back to the article. They point back to the profile page that lists all the content we've done for that game (or DVD, band, et cetera). Hope that clears things up.

[fuzzyslug]

We eds aren't particularly fond of the green intellitext links either. They're inserted dynamically. Meaning that editorial has nothing to do with it, for what that's worth.

I should be clear that I don't blame the rank and file for this move. Most of the time, the content producing staff don't have a say when it comes to advertising. In fact, it would be a conflict of interest if they did. I blame the suits. They spoil everything.

As it turns out, the two blue links in the article do not point back to the article. They point back to the profile page that lists all the content we've done for that game (or DVD, band, et cetera). Hope that clears things up.

I could have sworn that I tested this when I made the claim above. Could it have been my preferred browser, Firefox?

When I test this now, I get a double whammy. A quick look at the status bar reveals an address within the IGN domain. If I click on it, however, I get redirected to the site of the advertiser. Yea!? :x

[jeep]

IGN has been using them for some time now, and they've never really bothered me. There's some spyware out there that will do the same thing on all pages you go to, so if, for example, you're reading QT3 everytime the word "book" or "dvd" shows up it will link it to Amazon or something.

I tried this once using Overlib. I swear it wasn't a profit-driven thing, I just wanted to use the nested context feature: I made a database of links fronted by a word finder, So when I mentioned Apocalypse Now in an article, it would light up blue (the first appearance on a page) and if you hovered your mouse over it it listed the links I had for that title: usually a link to imdb, a link to a review I had written, a link to someone else's review as a counterpoint, and at the end of the list a link to the Amazon page for it.

It was pretty nice once I got it up but the initial link setup could be labor- and processor- intensive, I had to preload a bunch of the code to keep the server fast. I never finished developing it into a Xaraya mod, which was the original plan. I think the whole thing grew out of a conversation I had with Chet....

Odd thing is, those ads pay like shit, but some people are desperate to squeeze every penny out of every page.

...now you're just being cruel. I was only testing the idea, I swear. Plus it made the site look like it had no ads at all, which was nice.

/jeep/