The pop-up ad may not be as much of a problem these days, especially given that most browsers come with some form of pop-up blocker pre-installed, but back in the early days they were a huge pain in the ass. Pop-ups were everywhere and it seemed like for every site you visited you were closing down half a dozen other windows, and it was all because of Ethan Zuckermans work.
Ethan Zuckerman was a designer and programmer for Tripod.com and when one of their advertising clients (an unnamed car company) freaked out that their advertisement (a banner ad) was appearing on a webpage which “celebrated a**l sex”, something had to be done. The company didn’t want to be associated with such things and demanded their ads were removed (and likely a refund). The solution? What if an advert could launch in its own window. Zuckerman wrote the code and the rest is history, for better or for worse.
“I’m sorry. Out intentions were good.” said Zuckerman.
The pop up advertisement may have been a hateful thing, but it waved the way for the internet to become as big as it has. It showed that the web was commercially ripe for the picking and that lead to huge investments and it’s all because of a car manufacturer didn’t like porn.
Thank you The Verge for providing us with this information.
Image courtesy of The Verge.
