Having taken a couple of weeks away from the keyboard and the screen, as I’m browsing the web on my return to the fray, I feel like I’m seeing things with fresh eyes, and oh - how it hurts!

The Non-Stop Adverts

The advent of ubiquitous generative AI makes the automated generation of countless blog spam sites for search engines to gorge themselves upon inevitable. We can already see it in site after site of utter bilge and there’s no sign of it getting better anytime soon.

The reason for this is plain to see in the advertising that is forced, uncompromisingly, on any visitor that dares to surf without an ad-blocker. Can it really be that it’s still worth running a content-farm type site just to get advertising revenue?

I try my best to surf without an ad blocker, as I understand that some of these sites rely only on advertising to survive, but it’s becoming harder and harder to maintain that stance.

The cookie banners that appear on every website are a nuisance.

While they exist because of well-intended legislation, clearly the implementation chosen by many companies is actively user hostile.

Even as a seasoned user of the web, I only have so much energy to keep refusing cookies, and that’s of course what they want you to do. Just click ‘Accept’, it’s easier… right?

Well, I’ve had some success using the Hush Safari extension, but it’s not perfect. Sometimes I’ll forget its there and a website will randomly seem to freeze, but it’s far preferable to surfing without it active.

Fixing It

The thing is, neither of these are actually necessary to running a decent web presence. If you’re responsible for a web site why not take a look and see if you can make all your cookies strictly necessary? At the very least perhaps consider making the banner less user hostile?

If you’re generating cash through adverts on your site, why not take a look at the site that the visitor sees with fresh eyes. Perhaps you could reduce the advertising to get them to stay longer and click more?

It seems that there’s a bit of a movement underway to bring back the age of the ‘personal’ website rather than only experiencing the internet through the large platforms.

Hopefully addressing the above might make it more likely!