What a way to start the morning:
Yup, that’s right; my former employer the Lawrence Journal-World — one of the most ground-breaking, award-winning, forward-looking, innovative news organizations in the world — is now serving pop-under ads.
I really did think that my former bosses, friends, and colleagues there knew better. I can only hope this was a top-down do-it-or-lose-your-job edict, but even that smacks of the kind of dictatorial micromanagement I thought the company was above.
The Journal-World I knew thought of itself as a member of our small community. We viewed our role as that of service to this community. Apparently this is no longer true.
Pop-unders are the worst kind of advertising: outright user-hostile. Even if you ignore the fact that they just don’t work, they’re a terrible idea. They sell out user experience for temporary gains in revenues. But over time they drive users away, which leads back to failure.
I know the state of journalism is bad. But I also know that the long-term prospects for the online properties of the Journal-World are bright — I was there when those strategies were drafted, and nearly a year later I see no reason why they should have changed.
I can’t see how this decision could be anything else than a knee-jerk reaction to this recession; it certainly can’t speak to any sort of long-term planning.
Selling out your users to please advertisers isn’t a strategy; it’s just stupidity. This is a dark, dark day for what was once a beacon of hope in the online journalism landscape.
I’m so disappointed about this I can barely speak rationally, so enough said, I suppose.
Comments:
Word
I agree entirely.
I would guess knee-jerk reaction, too, and sadly, such moves are becoming more frequent every day. It's all done in the name of saving journalism, but as you say, these kinds of saving moves do more harm then good. I'm surprised LJ World felt they had to go this route, too.
I did it when nobody was looking, but I got one of the devs to erase the commit logs, so it's all good!
Looking at the current "belly fat" ads on WashingtonPost.com is what prompted me to finally install AdBlock Plus.
I guess that's the risk of "pushing the envelope" with advertising: you may get a short-term profit, but you lose out long-term respect and profit.
Jacob,
Is it possible that this popunder was from a remnant ad?
On our site, try as we might, sometimes a popup/under remnant sneaks in for a while before we squash it.
Jeremy: no, these are intentional. Look for the (obfuscated) JavaScript at the bottom of the page.
It took me forever to figure out where these "pop unders" were coming from. Every morning, with coffee in hand, I faithfully open my four favorite news sites; Drudge, Huffpo, CNN and LJWorld. After reading the news, and closing Safari, I then had to "x" out of 20-30 of these ads. It was annoying as hell, but each time I figured I had clicked on a link of a link (Drudge and HuffPo always have external links) and that's how my screen got filled. Oh, well. Then today, I noticed that a few times I saw the quick flash of the ad before it disappeared. And each time I saw it, I was on my own beloved LOCAL newspaper. And again on my very, very dear lawrence.com. WHAT THE HELL??
I can only hope this changes soon, or I'll be out of the loop on local events and picking up the Deadwood when ever I think about it.
The latest official statement said the system is suppose to only do ONE pop up per day (or visit?) IMO, one pop up is fine and completely understandable (it *is* media bankrolled by ads, after all) . They would be even more palatable if they were for a local business and not Publisher's Clearing House and auto insurance, but I don't know if they were given a choice in that matter.
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