Whether We Want it or Not...

I do realise that advertising pays for a lot that we get free from the internet – from e-mail accounts to traffic trackers – and so it would be unreasonable to expect an internet free of advertising. My complaint is against the ones that move.

Moving adverts in other places, like TV and cinema screens, point-of-sale displays and so on, can be ignored; you simply look away. You can’t do that with the internet. They’re right there, just off your eye line. They’re shaking, cascading, jumping up and down, flashing on and off, constantly seeking to distract you from whatever it is you’re trying to look at or read. They’re an irrelevant and highly irritating nuisance, and they shouldn’t be there. They will remain, of course, because the system only allows us the choices it wants to allow. And it smiles nicely while it’s playing sheepdog to the sheep.