"Flash" in the can

[Sundoggy]

That's it, I've had it. I have uninstalled Macromedia Flash Player.

Nice idea, wasn't it? Awfully easy to watch all those videos with it, isn't it? Advertisers figured out how to make it the 21st century version of the FLASH HTML tag awfully quick, didn't they? We're so easily trainable. We have gone from irritation at even banner ads, to full acceptance of outright TV commercials on part of the screen, in just a few years.

From what I can tell, nearly all the truly obnoxious online ad content is Flash powered. My limit was reached yesterday when I visited CNN and a THIRD OF THE PAGE was that obnoxious Apple ad with the dumpy PC guy and the oh-so-casually-hip Mac user. (Many ads would have done it but that one has a particular irritation for me.)

So I have reached a compromise. I'll use Flash in Internet Explorer and use IE only when I want to watch videos; in Firefox I'll turn Flash off.

[DS1]

1. It's delicious that Apple was the final straw

[Sundoggy]

2. Got nothing against Apples

I used to administer a Mac network in the old days. I still own an original Macintosh AND a Power PC, which my wife still plays games on.

But that ad just BUGS me. I'm a longhaired rock keyboardist who uses a PC on stage and they try to depict all PC users as dumpy old businessmen.

[DarkTirade]

3. The real irony is that Mac fought that very same stereotype for YEARS

because there were so many more games for PC than for Mac.

:P

[DarkTirade]

4. There are probably Firefox extensions that you can use to turn flash off temporarily

that way you don't have to use a different browser to watch videos, you just turn it on or off.

Any other geeks out there who pay more attention to this stuff than I do who'd know where to find 'em?

[Sundoggy]

5. I'll check on that, thanks

What I really want is one that does the inverse, temporarily turn it ON!

[DarkTirade]

6. Well, it works both ways. :P

[Sentath]

7. FLASHBLOCK

It replaces all flash with little flash icons that function as play buttons.

[Sundoggy]

8. Thank you very much! n/t