I suppose it's really a "begging blocker" that we need, rather than a traditional ad blocker. One website that I'm "forced" to use gives these begging messages on almost every page!
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Why is website design so awful today, generally?
- Thread starter Tozovac
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Microsoft does this on some of their sites. So you always open links to their pages in a new tab.
The other naughty betaviour is on news sites and others that direct your back button click to their adverts “before you go, please see…” etc. i despise that.
They’re called modals. And, yes, the greedy — as they always do — highly abuse these tools.
Modal UX design: Patterns, examples, and best practices - LogRocket Blog
To avoid hurting UX, we must maintain good modal anatomy, and the most important aspect is deciding when a modal is appropriate to use.
blog.logrocket.com
W3Schools.com
W3Schools offers free online tutorials, references and exercises in all the major languages of the web. Covering popular subjects like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Python, SQL, Java, and many, many more.
depends on which ad blocker you have. In 1blockr its the Annoyances switch:
with ublockOrigin you want to check the Annoyances lists:
note if you have trust issues and online privacy conscious, use a open source adblocker because I believe the adblocker extension CAN see all sites you visit
i'll give you that, plug-ins were annoyance but at the time was magically to see a video in the website. Now its replaced with bloated "apps" , visiting a modern site feels as heavy as launching Microsoft Excel.
They’re called modals. And, yes, the greedy — as they always do — highly abuse these tools.
Modal UX design: Patterns, examples, and best practices - LogRocket Blog
To avoid hurting UX, we must maintain good modal anatomy, and the most important aspect is deciding when a modal is appropriate to use.W3Schools.com
W3Schools offers free online tutorials, references and exercises in all the major languages of the web. Covering popular subjects like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Python, SQL, Java, and many, many more.www.w3schools.com
@Just_Kevin
With uBlockOrigin you can "zap" anything you do not like out of the web page albeit AFAIK this works only on Firefox and maybe Brave.
If you like safari, and a light browser user , give Orion a shot. Its supposed to be a light+webkit based (like safari) browser and can run extensions from both Chrome and Firefox. Its built by the guys behind the paid search engine Kagi.com . https://kagi.com/orion/
Its in beta still though. If you are heavy browser user I would say FF or Brave. You cant go wrong with Brave (Its like Google Chrome without Google spying code).
tell me how you like it. I am on Wipr for safari which is more lightweight but Blockr has more options.
I'm on the 14 day trial. The free version doesn't allow you to enable all of the blocks. At first I was not impressed, modals were still coming through. Then I turned on "Other Annoyances" and I have not seen one since; however my browsing activity has been light/limited since then. I need more days/browsing before I have a better idea.
I was still getting the request for my location, so I changed the Safari permission from Ask to Deny.
I have not noticed any slowing down of pages loading or other downsides.
I'm still getting modals appearing, but it's possible I'm getting fewer. Could just be wishful thinking. At this moment, I'm probably going to let the subscription go through and cancel the previous blocker.
you may want to give ublock origin lite a shot. its the gold standard in adblocking if you are not satisfied with 1blockr. it doesn't look as good though but free. make sure to enable annoyances filters
uBlock Origin Lite
uBO Lite (uBOL) is a reliable and efficient content blocker. The default ruleset corresponds to uBlock Origin's default filterset: - uBlock Origin's built-in filter lists - EasyList - EasyPrivacy - Peter Lowe’s Ad and tracking server list You can enable more rulesets by visiting the options...
apps.apple.com
Now a website that I visit regularly has added a new animated popup asking for donations. Even if you're an existing paid subscriber.
Edit: It has since been disabled for subscribers.
Edit: It has since been disabled for subscribers.
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Oh I hate those. I think there's a classic gaming site (Major Geeks) that pulls a similar stunt with a pop-up saying 'Leave without signing up and the bunny gets it' with a photo of a gun pointing at a pet rabbit. I know it's in jest but really now?
There's also a Safari annoyance where you get a similar pop-up but from Safari itself saying 'are you sure you want to leave this site? [stay on page] [leave page]' All I'm doing is reloading the Reddit home page! Why the extra click Safari? No wonder folks call Safari the modern-day Internet Explorer. Full of unfixed problems.
Albeit not related to design, the worst kind is when you make 1 donation they redirect you to another page with a letter asking you to donate more or subscribe to monthly donations.
Some people are shameless
I donated to the Heart Foundation once, only something like $20. I then ended up on The Mailing List. First this was sent by email. Unsubscribing from that resulted in them sending everything by post instead (how's that for disrespecting the donator's wishes?). Over the next few years they would have spent more than $20 printing and posting the requests for more money.
I just updated an older phone to iOS26 to test the waters. I turned on bold text, button shapes, decrease transparency, increase contrast, etc., to undo some of the changes that seemed kind of forced.
It looks closer to the best parts of iOS 6 now, and removed a lot of Flat Design.
Kudos so far!!
I'm hoping this trend bleeds into website design, and then app design. Buttons for action instead of text. Button shapes with some border/shading/3D aspect, to mimic the cues that work in "real life."
Again, kudos so far!!!
Edit:
but on the downside, be prepared for lots of lemming-like poor copying by those outside of Apple who must follow whatever Apple does:
It looks closer to the best parts of iOS 6 now, and removed a lot of Flat Design.
Kudos so far!!
I'm hoping this trend bleeds into website design, and then app design. Buttons for action instead of text. Button shapes with some border/shading/3D aspect, to mimic the cues that work in "real life."
Again, kudos so far!!!
Edit:
but on the downside, be prepared for lots of lemming-like poor copying by those outside of Apple who must follow whatever Apple does:
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I'm hoping for a modern return to Aqua. But so far, like Windows 11, it's mostly skin deep and mere 'hints' at what could be. Still mostly flat UI other than the liquid glass and camera icon. Wish it'd go further and extend to app UI, which is still mostly flat. A lot of icons still remain their iOS 7 counterparts such as Music, Phone, and Safari, albeit with a bit more 'depth' around the icon. The apps themselves are still flat as flitters. I remember the iOS 7 Notes app still having some texture (not a notepad paper texture, but some sort of faint leather texture) but now it's just all white (or black if in Dark Mode) which is even more a downgrade. Thankfully there's apps like SkeuoNotes (paid) that makes up for it.
I'll be glad when this modern waxing nostalgic trend for Tandy DeskMate and other '80s UIs goes away forever. I was there back then and it wasn't a good time.
I'll be glad when this modern waxing nostalgic trend for Tandy DeskMate and other '80s UIs goes away forever. I was there back then and it wasn't a good time.
Your question is for someone else but, when anyone asks a question like that, I think that's a loaded question (or difficult to answer) unless you clarify what aspect of skeumorphism one is talking about.
I think not defining "good and bad parts of skeuomorphism in interface design" led to issues like iOS7 created, which was a complete white-washing of iOS6 and threw out some good UI/UIx cues along with some questionable/tired/overdone cues that were ready for maturing/freshening, but which resulted in some major steps back in interface/usability.
Are you talking about "gingerbread" things like green felt, woodgrain, brushed steel, stitched leather that are more fun than functional?
Are you talking about the level of detail given to icons, such as 3D effects, drop shadows, true art that visually represents the application (vs flat design...think of Instagram's controversial icon redo, or Apple's Game Center icon redo in iOS7)
Are you talking about functional things like buttons that look like buttons? Like smart ways to differentiate info vs. controls vs. content, like smart use of borders/framing to differentiate things like we have in real life (like blotters & mouse pads & pencil storage areas on a desk)...like smart use of colors and font type to differentiate certain features/functions/information... like button shapes and/or smart use of "3D effects" or shading or drop shadows to quickly & almost subconsciously differentiate controls vs. content vs. info? I.e., the things that were largely thrown out with flat design and hiding controls under ellipses, hamburger icons, and/or vertical 3-dots, etc.
the definition of skeumorphism , afaik, is to mimic real life objects. Its not flat vs 3D.
I never stopped liking it. In fact, had my first 'smartphone' experience (I was using a Nokia 5185i into 2010, which had a flat, black and white UI until I got handed an iPhone 3GS after the boss got sick of the failing Nokia's battery causing many of his calls to me going missed or being cut off) been a flat UI I'd have been confirmed in my belief at the time that smartphones were the 'second coming of the Apple Newton' and stuck to my Nokia. But the thing was amazing. It went from being a lifeless black slab to a literal notepad, camera, radio (whatever internet radio app it had installed was awesome, it had a 'knob' to 'tune' stations, which were internet radio stations, showing as '80s Hits' or '70s Rock' in a 'display' and so on.), phone keypad, the works. It was fun to use, and I wanted to interact with it. I kept going to the App Store to see what aweseme apps were up next. that UI turned me into an Apple fan back then.
I have NEVER liked flat design. I grew up with CP/M, DeskMate, DOS, Windows 1.x, and Amiga WorkBench 1.x. I put up with it because nothing better could exist given the hardware at the time. Boy, was I glad when XP and Vista came out. Even more so when I got handed that 3GS and it made me crave smartphone life at the time.
Today? I just want to use it for a second and put it away because so-called 'modern' UI hurts my eyes similarly to how DeskMate in junior high did. Why revisit the '80s?!
I firmly believe nobody even knew what the word 'skeuomorphism' was until folks at WWDC 2013 made fun of it, and articles ran with it. I don't recall anyone complaning about Game Center's UX until AFTER iOS 7's launch event.
To call flat UI in 2025 'modern' would be akin to releasing 8-bit graphics in all AAA video games in 2025 'modern' and then calling 3D graphics in video games 'dated'. It makes no sense. Isn't progress supposed to be forward not backward? Flat design is so 1986.
I can somewhat forgive the younger folks who weren't there during the original flat design era in the '80s. I mean if their only experience with skeuomorphic UI was their grandma's ancient Windows Vista Netbook they were forced to use when visiting them, sure, you could somewhat forgive believing that UI was 'old' and 'outdated' if your only exposure to flat design was now, but for those of us old enough, we were there and it was NOT a fun time. The '80s were a horrid decade of bad fashion, the rise of consumerism (the song Material Girl by Madonna even), Reagonomics, the Chernobyl and Challenger disasters, carpeted bathrooms, sunk in bath tubs, corporate Memphis design (seen most prominently in Saved by the Bell despite being a '90s series), and the crude computing eras of DOS and CP/M. I cannot imagine for the life of me why anyone, especially those too young to have experienced it, crave the '80s as some sort of utopian period.
To bring up a common '80s trope, the whole flat design trend that began in 2012 with Microsoft (albeit failed) to now especially after Apple popularlized it, the era is what I term 'New Coke' but unlike then, Apple refused to care about the haters and considered them acceptable losses (any that jumped to Android) while Coca-Cola listened and killed the idea a couple or so years after.
I'd bet Jony Ive never had to use CP/M, DOS or DeskMate otherwise he would never have wanted to usher back that horrible period.
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