What do you hate about webpages? What kinds of things drive you crazy and make you leave the site cursing its space?

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

Answers

Animated gifs! AAAAAH, when I see those I flee! Because then Netscape never quite finishes loading, it just blinks and reloads and blinks and reloads, and there's a little animated gif dancing at the bottom of the screen and mocking you and you just want to grab it through the screen and choke it to death.

I also hate background images. Almost always, they obscure the text, and isn't the text the whole point of your site? Background colors good, background images bad.

I hate when people put Java applets on their splash page, because Java is slow and it tends to crash Netscape on my machine.

I hate embedded background MIDI. If I wanted to hear music, I'd turn on the damn CD player.

I hate when people say on the first page "If you're not using then go away! My page will suck for you!". OK, fine! I will go away! I didn't want to see your stupid page anyway!

Did I mention I really HATE animated gifs?

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

Site trackers. They're fine when they work. When they don't work, i.e., when Sitemeter's server is down for the ninth time that week, they crash my browser and piss me off. I hate them.

And tiny fonts. But that's about it.

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

I love the new search engine on your page. I knew someday I would be more popular than John Travolta in your eyes.

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

It's actually my JOB to use the web all day. I swear I am going blind and crazy from those spastic animated gifs. And the MIDI music! As if it's not bad enough that I have to research websites about diseases all day, I have to listen to a synthesizer loop of "Wind Beneath my Wings" molesting my Coltrane CD.

I also hate those rainbow divider bars. And usless website awards. And people who trap you in their frames. And those sites that somehow make your "back" button not work. How do they do that? Why do they do that?

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

Easily my least-favorite webpage feature is the Geocities-esque pop-up ad. The last time I hit a damn Geocities page, the pop-up ad that appeared didn't even have a little "x" in the upper right-hand corner that I could use to close it immediately; instead, it just sat there obscuring the text of the otherwise excellent (and fast-loading) site beneath it until I went through about three operations to close the bloody thing.

Along with everyone else so far, I am also very much an anti-fan of unnecessary sound or animation on pages.

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

...oh the shame of my ego-maniac-ism...at least i told you yesterday that i did a query on myself....*blushes bright red*...it makes me happy to revisit our mutual memories, you see...[you don't buy it, eh?]...all right then, i'm a shallow person who needs constant affirmation of my existence by seeing how many times my name comes up in a journal that is visited more often than my own...*weeps openly*...you happy now?...THE HUMANITY OF IT ALL!

...oh, and what bugs me?...people who use stupid dots instead of real punctuation...that chafes my hide...

*smirk*

[you know i'm joking, yes?...love you muchly, darlin']

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

I hate:

• pages with too many graphics, pages that take too long to load
• pages with white text on a colored background (you can't print it)
• pages where the image size is not specified (delays the whole page presentation until the image is received)
• pages with frames (although some are OK)

BTW, animated GIFs should not cause your computer to reload the page.  (While they are self-contained files, your computer may repeatedly read the file from cache. Reloading would be caused by a javascript swapping images.)  None-the-less, animations can be annoying.

Phil Greenspun (this site's host) has some very good guidelines for web page development (I wish more developers would follow them).

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

Oops. I think I just posted a blank reply. Sorry if I did.

I don't like MIDI music. It's rarely useful and always irritating.

I hatehatehate webpages that never update. If you're gonna let months go by without adding anything new, take the rassafrackin' page down.

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

You know what really burns my ass? When you perform and honest-to-God search on Excite or Yahoo! and get back what appears to be a perfect hit. You smile, congratulating yourself on how smart you are and blissfully content in thinking there's a certain rightness in the universe.

Of course, then you actually click that link, and find yourself staring at the "Amish Community Web Tribute to Butter Churns." Or "1001 Uses for Tin Foil." Or, what's even worse...when you get back something like a "Shrine to Lesbian Nazis who were Abducted by UFO's and Forced into Weight Loss Programs."

At this point, all memory of your original search has completely left your mind...and you're wondering why you looked up the etymology of South Asian curses.

And then (inevitably) your spouse/significant other wanders into the room to see what you're up to...and finds you staring at some website about adult men who apparently like to wear diapers at home.

Believe me: There's no easy way outta that one. All because your "preferred search engine" didn't check Meta-tags to category.

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

ok, so this has already been said a thousand times, BUT, i am gonna repeat it cuz it annoys the shit outta me. ok, here goes: i am a poor college girl trying to pay for most everything by myslef at a $30,000 a year school. i even went out last year before i started my freshman year and bought a computer with my own hard-earned money. picked it out my self, researched it myself, learned how to use it my slef. and the wonderful thing about this lovely computer is that it happens to have a wonderful sound system/cd player. so i DIDN"T have to invest in a whole OTHER STEREO SYSTEM!!! isn't that GREAT??? NO WAY MAN. IT SUCKS WHEN I GET ON SOME DUMB ASS' WEBSITE AND THEY ARE PLAYING "I DON'T CARE HOW YOU GET HERE, GET HERE IF YOOOOUUUUUU CAN..." AND I CAN'T HERE MY LEN CD OR MY NINA SIMONE CD OR MY CARL COX OR MY VAN MORRISON. I HATE THOSE FUCKING THINGS. um, ok. that over with, i also hate animated gifs, they annoy the shit out of me, and i hate those websites that go, "Hi! My name is ... and my FAVORITE things to do are make pretty webpages for you!" meanwhile, they suck ass. anyway. i think i am done with this rant.

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

Hate...Hate hate hate...When you go to a section that looks really really cool. And then they tell you that it's under construction. Just leave it down until it's done! Then put it up and let my play with it!

Grumbling. Stupid sadistic freaks.

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

I hate midi music on websites... It takes forver to load and sounds like shit. And pages that have everything on one page, thus taking forever and a day to load. I also hate background pictures that tile... ICK! And really small text is annoying as well. Aw hell - anything that isn't on MY webpage sucks!! LOL just kidding.

-- Anonymous, October 16, 1999

Enough with the damn music. I don't surf with my speakers on, and I just have to sit there while the stupid thing loads and loads and loads, and then mess with dialogue boxes when my computer tells me it's really sorry, but I don't have SuperSoundRager installed and would I like to go to their site and pick up the plugin now?

No, I would not.

SiteMeter. I'm waiting around for five minutes just so you can count your marbles.

A picture is not worth ten thousand words. I can read ten thousand words in the time it takes for Joe Webhead's pretentious little Photoshop artsy altered shot of his goth girlfriend to load up. I'm a speed reader. If your site lets me, I've read everything and I'm out of there before the picture is more than an infant box. If the picture sits there grinding before the words even think about showing up, I am so out of there.

DO NOT PUT PATTERNED BACKGROUNDS BEHIND YOUR TEXT!

ESPECIALLY IF THEY ARE BADLY TILED!

ESPECIALLY IF THEY ARE TILED AND PURPLISH BLACK AND LOOK LIKE SOMETHING OUT OF "ALIEN".

Just don't do it, okay? It hurts.

And if you can't spell, get someone who can to read your page before you post it. PLEEEEEEEEAAAASE! Do not trust your computer checker, either. Spell chequers dew knot work. If your spelling and grammar suck, I am out of there - and I am mocking you as I go. It's as bad as standing in front of a crowd of people with toilet paper stuck in your fly.

-- Anonymous, October 16, 1999

The originators of MIDI should publically apologize for the cruel and unusual (well, not any more) punishment they have made possible on web pages everywhere.

Also, the originators of Java. (They'll probably be 34,955th against the wall.)

BTW, whoever said it, in fact, browsers print light text perfectly fine. You just have to tinker with the Page Setup in Netscape. As I recall, IE doesn't even care; it just prints the text whatever color it is--I think; I could be wrong about that.

-- Anonymous, October 16, 1999

dude, you know what REALLY sucks? lemonbugg.com. holy waste of server space.

-- Anonymous, October 17, 1999

Yeah, I have to agree: Animated GIFs and MIDI files. Even if it's a fan page for a band you actually like, who wants to hear a bad synthsizer version of it when you could be listening to the CD?

OK, lemonbugg, I bit...and so does that web page. I have never seen such a bunch of lame rambling drivel in my life. I just wish I could get those 30 seconds back now...

-- Anonymous, October 19, 1999

Ooh, animated gifs bug me too. Other no-nos: -big backgrounds -big images period. They take far too long to load -blinking text.

-- Anonymous, December 26, 1999