I am reading along when suddenly a different document gets placed over what I am reading. Very impolite! Off-putting enough that I either switch to Firefox's "reader view"
Or I close the tab in anger.
It is true that my eyes, brain and fingers are slower that the machine, much of the time. Still, I don't like to be interrupted with a different document that I didn't ask for and don't want to see.
We have been watching Roku streaming for enough years that even the intrusion of an ad in the traditional timeslot for the traditional interruption for shampoo or a new car is irritating. Maybe she will say Yes and maybe she won't. How about a Coke?
I have read that a common characteristic among primate males like gorillas and me is grumpiness. I am developing a rapid response to intrusions and impoliteness and it is a high level of grumpiness. I am also offended when I am reading an article and some marketing genius has inserted a link to a totally different article on a totally different subject halfway through. What are they thinking? "About here, his modern nervous jerkiness will cut in and he may be vulnerable for a totally different subject and author."
A slightly different irritant comes in the form of a hot headline, "Get your new TV on us!", with an invitation to click here. I am already to read about the deal and you could have inserted information on this page already but you want me to click again? No deal. To get me hotter under collar, make the landing page after that click another required click. Watch me leave right now.
While I am on the subject of irritants and failures, I want to mention "How Writing Changed the World" on PBS Nova. I was really looking forward to thinking about our lives and books, notes and writing of all sorts. We watched the first episode and it was terrible. The most irritating production I have ever seen on PBS or anywhere else. They did discover a fine formula for confusion and a headache. Get some scholar from a non-English speaking country to speak lovingly about the treasured inscription on the wall. Leave the sound of his speech in the sound track. Flash up a English translation of what the scholar is saying. Meanwhile, superimpose some other comment in a different colored alphabet over the English translation. It is a great demonstration of how writing and trying to read the writing has fouled up parts of the world.
