I get a lot of questions about spam and pop-ups, the two banes of the Internet world. Spam really bugs me. Pop-ups bother me less, partly because they are easily avoided. Many pop-up killer software products exist and I’ve used a couple of them.
However, on my current computer, I actually don’t have any pop-up killer software, so I am subject to pop-ups. Because of that, I’ve avoided the About.com sites because they’ve started forcing you to wade through obnoxious full-page pop-ups to get to it. It’s a shame because there’s a lot of great information there.
If you don’t want to spend the money on pop-up blocker software, you can block the particularly offensive ads yourself using a feature built into Internet Explorer. Choose Tools|Internet Options and then click the Security tab. Click the Restricted Sites icon and then the Sites button. You can add a URL and then Internet Explorer will no longer display pages from that site.
For example, lets use the obnoxious About.com site ads as an example. Suppose I want to ditch the annoying full-page ad that comes in whenever I go to the Desktop Publishing page of the About site (http://desktoppub.about.com). Normally when you arrive there, the horrible full-screen pop-up appears and you have to ditch it. However, I was able to right click the window and choose Properties. In it, I discovered that the page comes from http://f.about.com. I added that URL into my list of restricted sites and now I can go to the About site unencumbered by the huge annoying window.
It’s not a perfect solution and you won’t be able to get rid of all the pop-ups you encounter. But for the most serious offenders, it’s a good work around. And the best part is it’s free.