I was really upset the other day when I went to Passive Aggressive Notes and saw they’ve added a crappy overlay. It’s one of my favourite websites for random laughs so I’ve got a dilemma – do I boycott the site or keep visiting regardless?

Shame On You, Passive Aggressive Notes!

Luckily it’s only a small overlay – it’s not like it blacks out the whole page like some do. Still, where did it come from? It doesn’t look too related to the website so maybe they’re getting paid when people take the survey?

I’ve only visited Gizmag once. Never again.

Shame On You, Gizmag!

I was trying to check the cinema times last night when this overlay got in the way – the terrible thing was that it followed me around when I tried to scroll away and the X button was always just off screen so it took me ages to close it. By ages I mean about 5 seconds, but in browsing time that’s long enough for me to say ’screw you Vue’ and close the website twice over.

Shame On You, Vue Cinema!

SEO Book is actually the worst offender I’ve seen so far. I’ve counted at least 2 different horrible overlays on various pages – in fact, even when I click ‘don’t ask me again’ guess what? It asks me again! I always say I won’t visit SEO Book again, but then I forget and I visit it and BAM! there’s another overlay getting all up in my grill.

Shame On You, SEO Book!

One thing I’ve noticed in my travels round the interweb is the growing number of intrustive overlays being used to…well, piss people off as far as I can tell. Let’s face it, do you ever take the survey or sign up to get spammed? I thought not! I’m going to start a new series naming and shaming sites that use horrible overlays – it’s called: OVERLAY SHAME

Shame On You, Wired!