By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 21/07/2026A generation ago, publishers and advertisers fell in love with pop-up ads. Early pop-ups were virulent in ways that are hardly imaginable today. 61/ 181
By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 21/07/2026Visiting a website summoned *dozens* of pop-ups, some of them employing dirty tricks like spawning as an invisible 1x1 pixel, or running away from your cursor when you tried to close them. They auto-played sound and music. They were *Satanic*. 62/ 1144
By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 21/07/2026We got rid of pop-ups by installing pop-up blockers. Browser vendors (starting with Opera, then Mozilla) blocked pop-ups by default. 63/ 1122
