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>Ads with tiny close buttons

I recently encountered an ad with a tiny close button that jittered, making it impossible to touch without triggering the ad popup. How clever.



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> have a fake 'x' such that clicking it just triggers the ad.

I always, always thought this is what X buttons do, so I was simply closing the tab :))


>tangential annoyances

Timely reminder, when ads take up the whole screen, or anything like that at all, they are not tangential.


> hands since they have a pop-up blocker.

ads since they have an ad blocker


Except for when you go to try and click that tiny x, only to find that there was an intentionally coded delay for another ad just above it that pushed the x lower on the page, so you end up clicking that other ad.

Or if you go to tap close but at that exact point an image finishes downloading, reflowing the page and moving the close button elsewhere so you end up clicking the ad. Grrr.

> A persistently visible ad for a paid service you don't want

Are you referring to the spiral-like “AI Assistant” icon in the right tray? Because that you can easily hide. (Right click ? “Hide” ? gone.)


Nice and to the point. I clicked on the "..." bubble out of curiousity, and it brought up some ad, which is fine. When I went to leave by hitting back, the ad came up again. I had to hit back again to close it, then back to come here. Just FYI.

AD: good spot! It actually line breaks on desktop view there, it must of snuck through.

>and half the time I'd end up clicking on the advertisement when it loaded.

Just as planned


Date: Dec 2020

Header image: stock photo showing tablet running Windows XP and Java application

Article relevance to market: 101%

In all fairness, this is *closes ad popup* an interesting page, thanks.


> it says the ad was displayed/clicked on a webpage

Where exactly does it say this?


Some folks use this fact to place ads in such way that when you want to click something by the time your finger taps the screen there is an ad underneath. So annoying.

> A persistently visible ad for a paid service you don't want, in a paid product you paid for

While I know what you mean, it’s a very tiny and rather subtle icon.


Even more annoying is when ads pop in a second or so later under the cursor position just before you click, taking you to the ad not what you wanted to click.

I think this just means they have to have a tiny X in the corner for you to try to tap and miss and click on the ad anyway.

Jimmy: "Just click on the little cross to close the ad."

Seriously, why are so many people complaining about this?


>who, while waiting to get into or out of garage, sitting in the car or soon to be sitting in the car clicks on ads to buy something? Wouldn't conversion rates be ridiculous?

This reddit thread says it uses a UI dark pattern of moving the "open/close button" from a familiar screen position formed by habitual use such that you accidentally click on an ad for a $3000 pet door:

https://old.reddit.com/r/myq/comments/xoxrlv/shady_af_advert...


On mobile (Android), a few times an ad covered half the screen and couldn't be closed... I had to reload the page.

Yeah, that closure was completely uncommented and mysterious. A later comment linked to a bug saying that the ad had been disabled, presumably because it was showing up where it shouldn't? WORKSFORME doesn't seem like the right resolution for that.
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