Bad Structure

There was an academically suggestive article, I was going to link to, out of The New Scientist, but when I went back to check it, much later?

Roll-overs, pop-ups, push notifications, and pointless cookies. Most heinous? Automatic video. Of the available screen real estate, perhaps 70% of my tabbed window was consumed with advertising. And not just advertising for the site itself. Or advertising, “Science!”

I feel like I have a duty to vet most of the material I link to, and even then, some gets through my process. However roll-overs, pop-ups, push notifications, and invasive cookies? When I get that, I tend to “block all” and skip any deep linking. More than one intriguing tidbit of information or entertaining linkage gets discarded due to the over–use of invasive techniques.

astrofish.net, pursuant to the terms of service, the “fineprint”, it does use a cookie system, but that’s easy enough to defeat, just means, whenever a web browser hits the site, have to log in to see the content.

Most of the “modern” sites offer to send ‘push notifications,’ which I don’t have enabled — I find it a little invasive. Another term? “Annoying.” I realize we have to scramble to grab errant readers’ attentions, some would say “fight for eyeballs,” yet I’m unwilling to fight. What I like is simple, easy, basic, and really?

Fewer layers between what I was thinking, and what appears on the website.

New content about how the stars affect us, and what to do about that, each week. Usually something fun, too.