Today’s sites are annoying

As a web developer, I have added annoying items to websites of my clients per their needs: popups, auto playing audio/video, a bunch of ads. A website needs to at least pay for itself for people to keep creating them; however, with the internet being a web of free content and software it can be difficult for site owners to regain their investment.

What bothers me

When I’m researching or simply just browsing the web I find these elements I once added to be very annoying, even more so than the ones I’ve added in the past. The worst for me is when I’m reading an article then 10 seconds into it, BAM!, a pop up ad telling me to sign up to a mailing list. I understand the need to pay for the site, but why does it have to be so in-my-face and annoying? Rather than clicking or even reading what the pop has to say, I look for the close button. I then leave the site looking for a less intrusive site. The web used to display what I wanted and searched for, now it seems that owners like to toss too much into my face.

Is there another way?

What else is the site owner to do? Installing these annoying ads have to make them money to pay for their server cost and the development and maintenance of the site. What are other alternatives to forcing information on their visitors?

Subscription sites

Site owners will only display content or desired product of their site with a monthly fee. Users pay a rate each month to have access to the site. The site will most likely not have any ads, it will look and flow well. But, you will have to pay for it.

Sold products or services

Some sites are simply trying to sell a product or service. My business site sells a development service, I have little need for ads. Every once in a while I’ll add one to see if I can get some affiliate sales. But all and all, I do not need to fund my site or service though ads. Other sites do the same, like Microsoft and Apple; they simply sell a product and it pays for all their site cost.

Donations

Sites like wikipedia.org pays for it’s cost through donations. Given that the site is ranked #8 on traffic in the world they must have some pretty strong and expensive servers. All the content is provided by the sites visitors so they save cost in that aspect. But for the cost of the site and it’s team, they need to make money. The site is kept ad free each year by a single donation drive and random user contributions.

So what annoys you?

Here is a small poll to help gain an idea of what the most annoying thing you see on a website. Don’t see it in the list? Leave a comment!

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