We’re continuing to list the Internet stuff you hate. Here’s my initial column on the subject; your responses, Part I and Part II. You can keep sending in your ideas — starting the sentence with “I HATE…” — to poynter@sree.net (with your name and affiliation).
First up: a response to a comment I made in an earlier column, recommending the Google Toolbar and its pop-up stopping features. It brought the following comment from an online journalist:
I HATE… “it when Poynter contributors recommend pop-up blocking software when they ought to know better. I’m sure, as an Internet journalist, that you are aware that many online news sites have found no better way to bring in advertising revenue.
“Consider my case. I’m an editor and sometime reporter at washingtonpost.com. My employer is able to pay me based on how many ads it can sell on its website. The fewer ads we sell, the better a case my employer has to shed workers. I don’t know about you, but The New Yorker hasn’t offered me any invitations to dine at Les Halles with Philip Roth and VS Naipaul just yet, so I’m still primarily concerned with paying the rent and buying my groceries. Pop-ups give me the money to accomplish those missions. So why recommend Google’s software, which could be called, for my purposes, ‘RentBlocker’?
“As an Internet user, I can echo the cry: ‘I hate pop-ups.’ As an Internet worker, I can safely say: ‘I need pop-ups.'” – Robert MacMillan, technology policy editor, washingtonpost.com.
I am curious what other readers, especially those working in online journalism, have to say about this.
I HATE… “sites that have forms for you to fill out, and when you hit ‘enter’ it informs you that you didn’t do something correctly (didn’t complete a required field, missed a number, or whatever) and when you go back to correct it you have to complete the ENTIRE form over again. I have found
it happens even on sites where I am purchasing something from major well-known companies. Very irritating.” – Susan Sirmons, director of market development, The Times, Shreveport, La.
I know what you mean, Susan, I hate it when this happens, too. The better sites will show you what’s incorrect and leave the rest alone. Even on the best sites, you have to usually refill the password (and “re-type password”) fields (which I don’t mind).
I HATE… “media websites that do not fix their print stories to reflect the fact that they are on a website! For example, having ‘turn to page 3B for more coverage’ is inexcusable on a website. It makes the publication look very unprofessional. I upload stories as an assistant city editor for a print publication, and it’s not that difficult to make sure that there are no references such as this.” – Erin Eschen, magazine journalism student, University of Missouri-Columbia School of Journalism
I HATE… “the pop-up at the Arizona Republic newspaper site that requires I tell them my sex, age, and zip code before I can continue reading their stories. After about the first ten times, I just grab something off my desk (water bottle, yogurt container, or other item with a zip code) and make up something. I’ve been a 22-year-old female, a 35-year-old male, and a 19-year-old female (I’m really 59 and male). Hopefully, I’ve fooled their online demographic machine into thinking young people are still reading newspapers! I used to work in TV news in Phoenix.. still have family there.. but the constant pop-ups are an unnecessary delay … At least now I’ve turned it into something I can have fun with with my phony sex and zip info!” – Harry Horn, Cape Coral, Fla.
Here’s a response from Mike Coleman, a senior manager at AZCentral.com: “I’m sorry to hear that this user is having frustrations using the site, but if they had sent a quick message to our customer service department we would have been able to help solve the problem in about two minutes. Considering 99 percent of our users are filling out the form once and not seeing it again, it’s quite clearly a problem on the user’s end, most likely involving cookies. Either they don’t have cookies enabled (they must in order to access the site), they’re deleting their cookies, or they have so many cookies already stored that they can’t accept the one we’re trying to serve. The only users we can’t offer much assistance to are those using niche browsers like WebTV, very old versions of Netscape, and very old versions of AOL.” (Thanks to Mike for the quick reply – whatever the exact problem that Harry is having, it’s a good reminder that we should all know how we deal with cookies).
Your turn: What do you hate? Let me know at poynter@sree.net.
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