This outfit called
Tribal Fusion specializes in making pop-up ads that evade pop-up blockers. Sure, they're just being shrewd businesspeople. They're making a product that their customers want. By the looks of their website, they're snagging clients left and right with their approach.
Ultimately I think these blocker-evading ads are self-defeating, but only when evaluated individually. If Company X advertises using these ads, I can elect not to spend any money on Company X products, to show my displeasure with their advertising techniques. At a certain point, Company X will catch a clue and realize that their in your face marketing technique is a detriment to sales, and they'll stop using such ads.
However, what if all of the companies in their market are using the same technique? O-level managers behave like sheep, no matter what you've read. It's a rare executive who has the cojones to buck an industry trend, which is why everyone generally loves a maverick. There are so few of them that it's refreshing to see one. But I digress.
Company X, Company Y, and Company Z now all use the same ad-blocking technique, forcing dilligent hackers to come up with new blocking software. The offense/defense war continues. Ultimately you wind up with a situation where all but the most dilligent web users find themselves bombarded with pop-up ads that can't be easily defeated.
I'm reminded here of the insufferably stupid little ad gizmos (I refuse to learn the proper term) that TV networks put at the bottom of the screen now. The worst part is, they're advertising for shows on their own network! People, if you just let me watch the damned show I'm currently watching, and stop hammering me with animated little ads for the next mini-series you'll be airing, I might actually be interested in staying loyal to your network. As it is, because all the networks are doing this sort of thing now, they're all annoying me to the same degree.
This only makes me want to avoid TV altogether. I use Tivo to watch only the shows I'm truly interested in, and I have absolutely no network loyalty. They're all trying to screw with my user experience, poisoning their own wells. Stupid, stupid, stupid!
I'm not alone in taking a pass on TV. More and more Americans are changing their TV habits, getting more entertainment and news from other sources. But what happens when the good tribe of happy marketeers at Tribal Fusion succeeds in poisoning the web? Where to we go to escape the infernal flashing annoyances of commerce? And how do the people who work at Tribal Fusion feel about creating a product that is designed explicitly to sabotage users' individual preferences?