jewelboxing ad on the front page makes my browser hang

December 11, 2004 5:16 PM

Matt, that jewelboxing ad on the front page makes my browser hang (Safari.) When can I start paying you to not see any ads on Metafilter?
posted by vacapinta to Feature Requests at 5:16 PM (28 comments total)

It's a good thing it shows how it opens and closes 'cause I never would have known that they do that.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 5:56 PM on December 11, 2004

My system hangs for about 2 seconds with Safari and the ad unit is PithHelmet-proof. It is an annoyance more than anything at this point.

[I didn't realize there was the animation until I clicked back on the page after the comment from EB above]
posted by birdherder at 6:13 PM on December 11, 2004

That ad confuses my Firefox (0.9.3, Linux) for a good five to ten seconds before the rest of the page is willing to render. I don't mind the ads in the first place (and I clicked through the jewelboxing one and bookmarked the destination, because the products look nifty) but it sure is a pain when bringing the page up.

I can block it in privoxy but I suspect that's not what the advertisers intend, so I figured I'd throw my two cents in.
posted by mendel at 7:00 PM on December 11, 2004

weird, I hadn't seen any problems with my safari/firefox/ie tests.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 7:18 PM on December 11, 2004

I've had the same in Safari. Haven't viewed Mefi in any other browser for a while. You can't click on anything until it's done whatever it's doing.
posted by tracicle at 8:16 PM on December 11, 2004

I have zero problems with Safari. Curious.
posted by rustcellar at 8:41 PM on December 11, 2004

It does the same thing to me in Safari. Firefox and Opera (both also on the Mac) had no problems with it.
posted by gyc at 8:59 PM on December 11, 2004

I have the same problem with Safari, FWIW.
posted by Dr. Wu at 9:49 PM on December 11, 2004

I hate that ad. It's jarring.
posted by The God Complex at 9:52 PM on December 11, 2004

It's a good thing it shows how it opens and closes...
Presumably the point is to show that their system allows for art inside, and not just the front.
posted by onshi at 10:29 PM on December 11, 2004

No problems with Safari here... Just a WAG, but are you folks sure you're using the most recent OSX update?
posted by Johnny Assay at 10:30 PM on December 11, 2004

Perhaps one day, all browsers will have flashblock. Watch flash movies only when you want to. And if Macromedia doesn't want everyone installing this, they'll do the decent thing and allow you to configure the plugin to start movies in paused mode.
posted by George_Spiggott at 11:01 PM on December 11, 2004

I was so about to recommend flashblock. Click-to-view, man. The only way to go.
posted by rafter at 11:16 PM on December 11, 2004

Johnny Assay: yup - everything's as current as can be, Safariwise and OSXwise. (Sorry - just re-watched The Apartment.)
posted by Dr. Wu at 12:08 AM on December 12, 2004

I don't keep flash installed with Firefox, which is what I surf with most of the time. Saves me a lot of hassle, and a lot of loadtimes. On the other hand, I get that annoying yellow bar at the top of the screen telling me I'm missing plugins that I don't want anyway.

I really wish we didn't have Flash ads on MeFi, though.
posted by SpecialK at 2:53 AM on December 12, 2004

I use Flashblock. It means I don't have to use anything more intrusive like Adblock or Privoxy, because 99.9% of annoying stuff on the web (ads or otherwise) is flash these days (well, if you are using a popup- and exploit-proof browser).
posted by grouse at 3:26 AM on December 12, 2004

It hangs Safari for me, too.. but i just stop the page from loading. I use flashblock with Firefox, but Firefox won't keep me logged in to Metafilter and one other site (i'm not alone, according to Bugzilla).
posted by reflecked at 5:04 AM on December 12, 2004

It doesn't hang for me, but ads do cover the dhtml title tag notes which members add to their links. More than slightly annoying, though presumably not unique to this ad (it's just that I never noticed it on other ads before).
posted by dash_slot- at 6:14 AM on December 12, 2004

No issues with Opera 7.50 (I'm a minority!).
posted by kavasa at 9:22 AM on December 12, 2004

Can I add a works-fine-for-me on Firefox 1.0 on Linux? No? Okay then.
posted by DrJohnEvans at 10:19 AM on December 12, 2004

I keep right clicking the ad, hoping that it has been changed to a gif so that I can block it. Can I configure a "I don't need these" in my user profile? I'm not being sarcastic, I really have zero need for these.
posted by jonah at 10:54 AM on December 12, 2004

I have flash disabled by default, so I hadn't even noticed it until this thread. But I would like to chime in and say flash ads on MeFi are a very very bad idea. Whatever happened to text-ads only? I'd say this is the thin end of the wedge but I fear we're inching our way to the thick end…
posted by fvw at 10:57 AM on December 12, 2004

I usually block it at the proxy, but when I don't, I also occasionally have problems with the ad. Can we just go ahead and not use Flash where a plain old image would suffice, please?
posted by majick at 11:31 AM on December 12, 2004

Flashblock! I didn't know there was such a thing and I hadn't thought to Google for it. Cool! (And if somebody dare call me a newbie I'll ask if anybody ever found the FTP site with Sheryl Crow nude pix.)
posted by davy at 12:53 PM on December 12, 2004

Firefox won't keep me logged in to Metafilter and one other site (i'm not alone, according to Bugzilla).

what does this mean?
posted by quonsar at 1:22 PM on December 12, 2004

Lone voice in the wilderness, but I actually like this ad. (I'm using some new-ish download of Mozilla, it doesn't hang for me) I was going to compliment Matt and say if ya gotta have ads on Metafilter, that's a pretty low-key, tasteful way to go. Besides, we love Coudal Partners, don't we? They're the ones who thought up the jewelboxing thing.
posted by Lynsey at 2:33 PM on December 12, 2004

the flash ad screws up the hoverbox for the link title on the textad above it on firefox 1.0 WinBlows2k
posted by quonsar at 10:36 PM on December 12, 2004

Now, I really dig jewboxings and coudal so I don't mind this ad in the least, as it's not bugging up my browser (firefox+panther). But that guy on a bike really bugged me.
So I'll second the "when can we pay not to see ads" question, I think Matt has a great opportunity here to see if that type of 'upgrade' works out (for his economical concerns with the server and bandwidth and all), which could prove interesting for lots of other websites on the web. A trend might start, and it would be all good... *daydreams*
posted by dabitch at 7:52 AM on December 13, 2004