Created by me. This is a screenshot of a copyrighted website, video game graphic, computer program graphic, television broadcast, or film. It is believed that screenshots may be exhibited on Wikipedia under the fair use provision of United States copyright law. File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file...

Created by me. This is a screenshot of a copyrighted website, video game graphic, computer program graphic, television broadcast, or film. It is believed that screenshots may be exhibited on Wikipedia under the fair use provision of United States copyright law. File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file...

Dozens of pop-up ads cover a desktop.

Pop-up ads are a form of online advertising on the Graphic representation of the world wide web around Wikipedia The World Wide Web (WWW, or simply Web) is an information space in which the items of interest, referred to as resources, are identified by global identifiers called Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI). Basic terms Hypertext is viewed using a program called... World Wide Web intended to increase Example graph of web traffic at Wikipedia in December 2004 Web traffic is the amount of data sent and received by visitors to a web site. This is determined by the number of visitors and the number of pages they visit. Sites monitor the incoming and outgoing traffic to see... web traffic or capture email addresses. It works when certain web sites open a new A web browser is a software package that enables a user to display and interact with documents hosted by web servers. Popular browsers on the PC include Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. A browser is the most commonly used kind of user agent. The largest networked collection of linked... web browser window to display Generally speaking, advertising is the paid promotion of goods, services, companies and ideas by an identified sponsor. Marketers see advertising as part of an overall promotional strategy. Other components of the promotional mix include publicity, public relations, personal selling, and sales promotion. History Advertisements painted on the side of buildings... advertisements. The pop-up window containing an advertisement is usually generated by JavaScript, often mistyped as Javascript, is an object-oriented scripting language based on the concept of prototypes. The language is most well known for its use in websites. It was originally developed by Brendan Eich of Netscape Communications under the name Mocha and then LiveScript but then renamed to JavaScript... JavaScript, but can be generated by other means as well. A less intrusive variation on the pop-up window is the pop-under advertisement. This opens a new browser window, but in the background, so as not to interrupt the user's page-view.

For early advertising-supported web sites, A web banner or banner ad is a form of advertising on the World Wide Web. This form of online advertising entails embedding an advertisement into a web page. It is intended to attract traffic to a website by linking them to the web site of the advertiser. The advertisement... banner ads were sufficient revenue generators, but in the wake of the Dot-com (also dotcom or redundantly dot.com) companies were the collection of start-up companies selling products or services using or somehow related to the Internet. They proliferated in the late 1990s dot-com boom, a speculative frenzy of investment in Internet and Internet-related technical stocks and enterprises... dot com crash, prices paid for banner advertising clickthroughs decreased and many vendors began to investigate more effective advertising methods. Pop-up ads by their nature are difficult to ignore or overlook, and are claimed to be more effective than static banner ads. Pop-ups have a much higher click rate than A web banner or banner ad is a form of advertising on the World Wide Web. This form of online advertising entails embedding an advertisement into a web page. It is intended to attract traffic to a website by linking them to the web site of the advertiser. The advertisement... web banner ads do.

Most users regard pop-ups as a nuisance. In the early 2000s, all major web browsers except Internet Explorer, abbreviated IE or MSIE is a web browser from Microsoft currently sold as part of Microsoft Windows. As of 2005 Internet Explorer is by far the most widely-used web browser, although since 2004 it began losing usage share to other browsers. The current estimation is roughly 90... Internet Explorer (then the most popular browser and still 2004 is a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. It was designated the: International Year of Rice (by the United Nations) International Year to Commemorate the Struggle against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO) Elections were held in 73 countries during 2004. See a list of elections... as of 2004) allowed the user to block unwanted pop-ups almost completely. In 2004, Microsoft released A typical Windows XP desktop. Windows XP (codename Whistler, also known as Windows NT 5.1) is the latest desktop version of the Microsoft Windows operating system. It was made publicly available on October 25, 2001. Two editions of Windows XP are most commonly available: Windows XP Home Edition which... Windows XP SP2, which added pop-up blocking to Internet Explorer. Many users, however, remain unaware of this ability, or else choose not to use it. Some users install non-Microsoft ad-blocking software instead. Advertisers continually seek ways to circumvent such restrictions. Many of the latest pop-ups are created using Macromedia Flash or Flash is a graphics animation program, written and marketed by Macromedia, that uses vector graphics. The resulting files, called SWF (said like swiff) files, may appear in a web page to view in a web browser, or standalone Flash players may play them. Flash files occur most... Flash and have extensive animation and trickery.

Pop-up ads can also be spawned as a separate process (that is to say, apart from the browser) on the user's local The tower of a personal computer. A computer is a device or machine for making calculations or controlling operations that are expressible in numerical or logical terms. Computers are constructed from components that perform simple well-defined functions. The complex interactions of these components endow computers with the ability to... computer. This is typically because of a Strictly defined, spyware consists of computer software that gathers and reports information about a computer user without the users knowledge or consent. More broadly, the term spyware can refer to a wide range of related malware products which fall outside the strict definition of spyware. These products perform many... spyware infestation, or because the user has voluntarily (or involuntarily) installed Adware or advertising-supported software is any software application in which advertisements are displayed while the program is running. These applications include additional code that displays the ads in pop-up windows or through a bar that appears on a computer screen. Adware helps recover programming development costs, and helps... adware.

A particularly common type of pop-up ad exploits the Messenger service in Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT), (founded 1975), headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA, is the worlds largest software company (with over 50,000 employees in various countries, as of May 2004). Microsoft develops, manufactures, licenses and supports a wide range of software products for various computing devices. Its best known product... Microsoft's Windows XP operating system. Claims have been made that this type of pop-up has been used to commit Extortion is a criminal offense, which occurs when a person obtains money, behaviour, or other goods and/or services from another by wrongfully threatening or inflicting harm to his person, reputation, or property. Euphemistically, refraining from doing harm is sometimes called protection. Blackmail is one kind of extortion -- specifically, extortion... extortion. Threats of legal action against the company D Squared Solutions has caused them to stop using this technique.

Pornography (from Greek πορνογραφια pornographia — literally writing about or drawings of harlots) is the representation of the human body or human sexual behaviour with the goal of sexual arousal, similar to, but (according to some) distinct from, erotica. Pavonazzeto... Pornographic web sites are among the most common users of pop-up ads. Some particularly vicious types of pop-up ads (again, most often seen in connection with adult entertainment sites) appear to have either been programmed improperly or have been specifically designed to "hijack" a user's Internet session. These forms of pop-ups sometimes spawn multiple windows, and as each window is closed by the user it activates code that spawns another window -- sometimes indefinitely. This is sometimes referred to by users as a "Java trap", " This article is about spam, the abuse of electronic communications media to send unsolicited bulk messages. For the brand of tinned pork made by Hormel Foods, please see SPAM. For other uses of the term, see Spam An email folder of kmail full of spam emails collected over the last... spam cascade" or "Pop-up Hell" among other names. Usually the only way to stop this is to close the browser.

Another variation of pop-up, commonly called "mousetrapping", particularly fills an entire screen with an ad or Web page, in the process removing any menu bars or other on-screen icons by which the user can close the window. This problem mainly affects users of the Microsoft Windows is a range of commercial operating environments for personal computers. The range was first introduced by Microsoft in 1985 and eventually has come to dominate the world personal computer market. All recent versions of Windows are fully-fledged operating systems. Windows was developed for IBM PC compatible computers... Windows version of Internet Explorer, abbreviated IE or MSIE is a web browser from Microsoft currently sold as part of Microsoft Windows. As of 2005 Internet Explorer is by far the most widely-used web browser, although since 2004 it began losing usage share to other browsers. The current estimation is roughly 90... Internet Explorer. Often, access to other open windows and Web pages is denied and the only way for PC users to close these ad windows is via the This article is about Control-Alt-Delete, the keyboard shortcut. For the web comic, see Ctrl+Alt+Del (webcomic). A humorous image created as a parody of Control-Alt-Delete Control-Alt-Delete (often abbreviated to Ctrl-Alt-Del) is a computer keyboard command on IBM PC compatible systems. It... control-alt-delete command, which can result in all active IE windows (including those not connected to the pop-up) closing. Another way to close the mousetrapping window could be to hold down the Alt button and press F4. This closes the active window. Another variant, a "static image ad", is a pop-up ad that stays in a fixed position of a window of an ad-supported program. This kind of ad dosen't distract the computer's concentration of a program window like a traditional popup ad does. One example of an ad-supported program that uses a static image ad is Kazaa Media Desktop (once capitalized as KaZaA, but now usually left as Kazaa) is a peer-to-peer file sharing application using the FastTrack protocol. It is commonly used to exchange mp3 music files and is (as of late 2004) the 2nd most popular application for this purpose (the first... KaZaA.

Browsers that block pop-up ads

The pop-up blocker included with Internet Explorer 6.0 SP2

• Gecko is the open-source web browser layout engine used in Mozilla, later Netscape releases and several other products. Written in C++, Gecko is designed to support open Internet standards. Originally created by Netscape Communications Corporation, its development is now overseen by the Mozilla Foundation. Gecko offers a rich programming... Gecko-based browsers
  • Mozilla (a.k.a. the Mozilla Suite or the Mozilla Application Suite, and codenamed Seamonkey) is a free, cross-platform Internet software suite, whose components include a web browser, an email client, an HTML editor and an IRC client. Its development was initiated by Netscape Communications Corporation based on the... Mozilla
  • Firefox redirects here. For other uses, see Firefox (disambiguation). Mozilla Firefox (originally known as Phoenix and briefly as Mozilla Firebird) is a free, cross-platform, graphical web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and hundreds of volunteers. Before its 1.0 release on November 9, 2004, Firefox had already garnered... Mozilla Firefox
  • The logo of Netscape Navigator, as well as of Netscape Communications Corporation. Netscape Navigator, also known simply as Netscape, is a web browser. Once the flagship product of Netscape Communications Corporation and the dominant browser in terms of market share, it now has only a relatively small number of users... Netscape 7
  • Camino is a Mac OS X web browser based on Mozilla. It replaces Mozillas XUL_based user interface with a native Cocoa implementation. Camino doesnt include Mozillas email or composer components; it concentrates on the providing just the browser by embedding Mozillas Gecko layout engine in a... Camino
  • This page is about a web browser. For the type of ship, see Galleon Galeon is a web browser for GNOME based on Mozillas Gecko layout engine. Galeons developers self-declared mission was to deliver the web and only the web. At the time of Galeons... Galeon
  • Epiphany
• Internet Explorer, abbreviated IE or MSIE is a web browser from Microsoft currently sold as part of Microsoft Windows. As of 2005 Internet Explorer is by far the most widely-used web browser, although since 2004 it began losing usage share to other browsers. The current estimation is roughly 90... Internet Explorer (if Windows XP SP2 is installed)
• Opera is a cross-platform internet software suite consisting of a web browser, e-mail/news client, address book, newsfeed reader, IRC chat client, and download manager. It is actively developed by Opera Software of Oslo, Norway. Its core layout engine (Presto) is licensed by business partners such as Adobe... Opera
• Safari is a web browser developed by Apple Computer, Inc. for its Mac OS X operating system. It is the standard browser for Mac OS X versions 10.3 (Panther) and later. Overview Safari uses Apples brushed metal user interface, has a bookmark management scheme that functions like the... Safari
• America Online, or AOL for short, is a corporate online service provider and Internet service provider (ISP). AOL is owned by Time Warner, which uses the NYSE stock symbol TWX. Today, America Online is perhaps best known for being an ISP. AOLs main competitor is Microsofts MSN. AOL... America Online 9.0
• In computing, Konqueror is part of the K Desktop Environment (KDE), primarily developed for the Linux platform, but also available for some other platforms (including BSD and, recently, Microsoft Windows, although Windows support is very limited). It functions as a file manager, web browser, and file viewer. Like the rest... Konqueror

Add-on programs that block pop-up ads

• Googles main pages unusually spartan design, uncluttered appearance and quick loading time have contributed greatly to the sites mass appeal. Google is a U.S.–based search engine owned by Google Inc. whose mission is to organize the worlds information and make it universally accessible... Google's Google Toolbar (http://www.toolbar.google.com/)
• KillAd  (http://www.iomagic.org/fsc/pleasedontlinkheredirectly.htm) -- freeware
• NoAds (http://www.southbaypc.com/NoAds/) -- freeware
• Pop-up Stopper
• Proxomitron, the Universal Web Filter was created by Scott R. Lemmon and is a configurable personal web proxy tool. It can be configured to block popup ads, blinking banners and annoying sound clips through the use of regular expression filters. He distributed the program under a ShonenWare license; it was... Proxomitron
• Popup Blocker by Osborn Technologies http://www.osborntech.com/pub.htm -- An unobtrusive freeware popup blocker for Internet Explorer
• MSN (or Microsoft Network) is an internet service provider and web portal (initially meant to be a parallel net to the Internet) created by Microsoft on August 24, 1995, coinciding with the release of Windows 95. The MSN moniker has since been extended to Microsofts Hotmail webmail service and... MSN Toolbar (http://toolbar.msn.com/)
• Bayden Systems Popup Blocker (http://www.bayden.com/popper)

See Also

• In computer security technology, a virus is a self-replicating program that spreads by inserting copies of itself into other executable code or documents (for a complete definition: see below). Thus, a computer virus behaves in a way similar to a biological virus, which spreads by inserting itself into living... Computer virus
• Categories: Stub | Direct marketing | Promotion and marketing communications | Marketing ... Junkmail
• Malware (a portmanteau of malicious software) is any software developed for the purpose of doing harm to a computer system. Malware can be classified based on how it is executed, how it spreads, and/or what it does. The classification is not perfect, however, in the sense that the groups... Malware

External links

• BannerReport.com - The Internet Advertising Resource Guide (http://www.BannerReport.com) - includes a searchable gallery of 15 000+ banner ads
• ASAP! (http://jenett.org/asap/) - A Stand Against Pop-unders
• Pop-up Test (http://www.popuptest.com/) - a site for testing how well your pop-up blocking software works
• Free Pop Up Blocker (http://www.freepopupblockers.net/) - lists several free pop up blocker add-ons
• How to Find, Remove and Prevent Spyware, Internet Intruders, and Pop-Ups (http://chinese-school.netfirms.com/computer-article-spyware-pop-ups.html)
• What's up with popup ads? (http://www.straightdope.com/columns/041015.html) (from Cecil Adams is the pen name of the author of The Straight Dope since 1973, a popular question and answer column published in The Chicago Reader, syndicated in thirty newspapers in the United States and Canada, and available online. Billed as the Worlds Smartest Human Being, Adams responds to... The Straight Dope)
• SurferBeware.com Popup Ad Help (http://popups.surferbeware.com) — Everything you ever wanted to know about popups, including how they are created, what makes them tick, and most important how to stop them.