It’s almost time for my annual Things I Want Gone from the Web post.
I had quite a list last year, and I’ve been collecting whines, rants, and nags over the past year, but this year, I want to know what you want gone from the web.
Let’s make this a community whine, rant, and nag.
So what do you want to see gone from the web and blogs next year? What fad do you want to see fade away? What tool, site, or gimmick do you want gone?
Site Search Tags: what I want gone from the web, bad web practices, web practices, web standards, poor blogging, bad blogging, ranting, rant, whine, nag, poor practices 
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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.
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25 Comments
In your post Things I Want Gone from the Web in 2007, you mention both Out-of-control Advertising and Music on Websites. Something I’ve noticed this year is the combination of the two.
It’s bad enough that so many pages are still full of ads, distracting from the content. We have pretty much trained ourselves to ignore them (for the most part). Now we open a page and they begin playing sound automatically!
Let’s take two of the most annoying elements of the world wide web and combine them into one hideous technological blunder!
Who are the ad wizards who came up with this one?
I want table-based web pages gone from the web. Seriously, when the web design circles are abuzz with the talks of complying with the web standards, many stubborn (or ignorant) web designers continue to use tables to structure the web pages. So let’s hold mass virtual protests to stop the use of tables!
Your list for 2007 is a sad reminder that often the things we wish would go away are those that will always be with us. Nevertheless I’d like to see an end to the meme. They’re chain letters in a new format. I used to think they were fun, but now they’re just an annoyance, moreso perhaps because those sending them are well-intentioned.
Internet Explorer all versions! Developing for the web would be so much better without having to deal with IE and its quirks.
RSS Feed Scrapers. They all need to get a life and learn to write their own content.
Spammers. Seriously. I don’t need to know how to date women ten years my senior, how to “enhance” my “baby maker” (credit to ses5909 over at SitePoint and The Blog Experiment for coining that one), or make some other company money while working at home when I’m perfectly capable of making money for myself while working at home.
Though the funniest piece of spam I ever got was someone offering to help me get my United States Green Card (even though I was born here).
Splogging can go take a flying leap – I wouldn’t miss it for a moment!
PS – Thanks Lorelle for all the excellent resources you offer at your blog. It’s truly appreciated.
Three words: Flashing…Banner…Ads…
Maybe I’m just too easily distracted by shiny onjects, but I CANNOT focus on the content of a website, or worse, read a blog post when a banner is flashing, or some stupid monkey is running back and forth between rifle sights!
I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one out there that hits his “back” button as soon as the pyrotechnics start.
-Perry
I really think I’d like to see Myspace and all it’s many clones gone. I don’t get the point of it, especially if you already talk to the people you have on your friends lists outside of the internet. I have a personal grudge against Myspace. The drama on there has caused many headaches for me.
@ChaoticKitten:
Don’t expect social networking sites to go away any time soon. While some see them as a blight, especially parents worried about their children, they are the future of the web as people find commonality across borders and cultures via the web.
Any time you get a mass of humans together, there will always be drama. Just ignore it. It’s not your drama. Stay out of it. Create your own. 😀
What I do see is improvement in connecting with people with like interests, much like CompuServe did in the early days of the web with its forums. That’s where the future lies and blogs will be a part of it.
Blog posts on main pages that ask questions but then don’t have an obvious link to where to comment.
Blog posts that are basically long lists of previous blog posts.
Blogs with black backgrounds.
Blog comment forms in pop-ups (some Blogger blogs do this).
Content in Flash
Flash intros
Captcha’s required to comment on a Blog
Email Spam
Top 10 things I’d like to see GO for 2008.
1. Blogger (blogspot)’s exclusive commenting system.
2. The term “link exchange” altogether.
3. MySpace (even though: yes, I do have an account there).
4. Ads on blogs without traffic to support income.
5. Bloggers who don’t try to write well.
6. Free themes that require things. Free is free: charge or don’t post it.
7. News sites that require “free” registration to read “rest” of articles.
8. Geo tracking on photos.
9. Junk Blogs that post my content and link back to me (aren’t they nice?)
10. Campaign trail blogs.
Videos not done in flash.
@Jersey:
I agree, however, which format would you prefer?
Hi, I came here from Liz.
I don’t know if this applies parts of the world, but I’d really love to see all the meanness and nastiness disappear from blogs. I’d love to see other strategies than attacking famous bloggers to promote blogs 🙂 And I’d definitely be happy to stop seeing spam comments in 2008. But that’s pure wishful thinking 🙂
I’m surprised no one has mentioned partial RSS feeds yet. It’s absolutely incredible how many large mainstream publications continue to do this (or worse yet, no RSS feeds at all).
I espeically hate my hometown Washington Post’s use of RSS feeds — I have about 6 columns I like to track, but half post just excerpts (with no formatting) and the other half just use the titles for RSS (ie. no content at all).
Now before you say they need to protect their money, I offer you this: I still subscribe to the paper version of the paper. I simply find lots of great articles that I dont ever see promoted in the online version.
And if you think if they offer a full feed, then they wont get page views: this has been proven wrong. Heck, Feedburner has even said they see comparable clickthrough rates. Its better to have a full feed that people subscribe to and read than a partial feed no one bothers subscribing to. And for what its worth, I often click through just to comment or see what others have said.
And if these large sites believe they put their income in jeopardy, I suggest they use feeds like TV Squad does…provide a lengthy excerpt. TV Squad often provides 3-5 paragraphs in their feed, which is just enough to intrigue me to click through and comment (which I wouldnt’ve based on just the first paragraph) or realize this post isnt for me (which would’ve just wasted their bandwidth if I’d clicked through to realize the same).
Sorry for the length, this is just really annoying. Partial RSS feeds sometimes work (although I still greatly prefer full feeds), but you MUST give more than a sentence or unformatted paragraph.
I agree with most of the comments so far. DEFINITELY with getting rid of annoying ads, flashing stuff, music. Damien’s comment was the first I’d hear of geo tracking on photos.
I would also like to see the end of sites using “pimp” as if pimping is a cool thing to do, like “pimp your blog”. That’s one slang term that’s just horrible, IMHO.
@Lorelle:
What I mean is that all videos not done in flash, but rather wmv, realplayer, quicktime, etc…those all should be done away with, because portals like YouTube have made Flash more mainstream and consistent.
Blog commenters who use “um” to lead into a patronizing statement that they believe is self-evident but is in fact a matter of opinion.
Overuse of the f word.
“Easy site builders” – including the one sold in a gift box that looks like a Chinese food carton – which delude hardworking small business owners into thinking they can have an effective, professional web presence for £30 a year. One of the easy site builders has made a marketing strategy out of mocking and deriding professional web sites and site developers as “expensive” and “difficult”. Begone with them and with the embarrassing, amateurish web sites they produce.
Lorelle, will the WordPress.com snow be getting a mention on this year’s list? It’s terribly annoying to have my computer go nuts when I hit a blog with the snow turned on.
I’m glad it’s almost over.
@ Matt Algren:
LOL! Oh, I wish. You did turn if off on your blog, right? Or rather, didn’t turn it on. 😀
I love the sentiment, and all of the “young’uns” (of all ages) got a kick out of it. But luckily today is the day the feature will be removed. Thank goodness. I’m with you. Unfortunately, we are the minority among gimmick lovers who tend to rule.
content in flash or javascript that can’t be linked to
search result poisoning… i really hate it when i search for a term and all I get is crap
Image CAPTCHA’s should die a slow and excruciatingly painful death. I also want the web to be rid of partial RSS feeds in favour of full ones. I used to use Live Bookmarks in Firefox but now with a web-based reader, most of the “time-saving” aspect of RSS is gone with partial feeds.
I subscribe to your list from last year and I’ll add sites and blogs having light text on dark background, which makes for poor readability, in my opinion.
I know this is an old post, but it is an appropriate place to add my beef with websites that use uncontrollable videos. The type that come with no play/pause/rewind controls at the bottom, and no indication of how long the video is.
I usually just shut them down when I realise that there is no way of pausing the video if I need to get up for a minute. Also, by there being no controls I tend to think that the author of the video believes, somewhat arrogantly, that what he/she has to say – usually a marketing spiel – is so good, that everyone will be clambering to hear every single word.
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