Hi Marc. Thank you for your feedback. I will pass it along.

I agree, and I would like a specific answer, other than 'feedback will be passed along." Flyouts and popups are annoying.

I agree.  I find the popup ads very irritating and distracting.  I would like to globally turn them off.

I'm going to keep this thread going as it appears the check mark answered closes it. I find the flyouts, popups and other juvenalia extremely annoying.  I hope everyone else does too and helps me keep this thread going until the problem is solved. "Feedback passed along" is NOT an answer.

Yes, I will be a very infrequent visitor as well. the constant slide-in messages are truly annoying. Even the big(ger) guys know that you only annoy people once a session... not several times. Perhaps the big cheeses of the Patch should look at the click-through rate (and will most likely discover it's very low) and will find that these things do not work well. Love the Patch!

Hey Troy,

Is this issue going to be addressed or not?  I posted a similar msg about a week ago, with no response whatever.  I just spotted this thread and can't believe that Patch has been ignoring this annoyance for almost 6 months.  Do you guys have an actual IT dep't or is it outsourced to somewhere in Eastern Europe?

Troy, are you there?  Or were you just a summer intern?  Will there be any further info on this annoying problem?

Hi Gary,

Thank you for your continued interest in improving the Patch site. We can assure you the feedback is taken seriously, and while we can't meet the requests of every user who submits feedback, we do our best! We've recently streamlined the "read more" slider based on your feedback. Thanks again and don't hesitate to contact the support team directly with any issues, at support@patch.com.

-Troy

Troy, why not just give registered users the option of turning them off?

Regarding Troy's Jan. 04, 2012 post:

Thank you for the assurance that our "feedback is taken seriously." But the remedy you present, "We've recently streamlined the 'read more' slider based on your feedback," completely misses the point.

The amount of copy inside the "Read More" slider has nothing to do with why it draws complaints. The slider, whether copy-heavy or even blank, is intrusive. It barges in just a few seconds after we've begun reading, and interrupts us from continuing to “Read More.” The movement, the animation, pulls our eyes away from what we’re reading.

In a strange way, the slider is perfect: it's 100% counterproductive to what it's intended to accomplish. The slider that tells us to read more stops us from reading more.

I have a theory to explain why the Corporate Patch marketers came up with this blunder. It's a common mistake. Someone says, "We've got to make the site livelier!" The designer team cheers, because they've got marching orders to use their toys to do fun stuff. But just because you have the tools to make animated graphics doesn't necessarily mean you should use them. You have to ask, “Does this deliver the message better?” In the case of the slider, the answer is not "Yes."

Here's a better way: Tell Corporate Patch to replace the slider with a non-animated boxed "Read More" link that loads with the story. Then, guess what? Each time readers click on a Patch story, they'll have a little more time to "Read More."

Thanks, Marc

Totally agree! I hate that thing more than anything on any website I frequent. Completely distracting, annoying, and never, ever shows me something I want to see. Horrible idea, whose ever it was. Please... Make It Stop!

Troy,

I think Marc pretty much summed it up in his last post.  The slider is, in fact, completely counterproductive.  It jumps in from the side, covering the text of the article I'm trying to read, and usually wants me to look at an article that's about 3 months old.  The "streamlining" you mentioned isn't obvious to me; the slider is still the same size and is still just as annoying.  The solution is to give users the option to simply turn the darn things off.  Why is this so hard for you understand?

Gary

Make it stop!  

Make it stop!  

Make it stop!  

Make it stop!  

Make it stop!  

Make it stop!  

Make it stop!  

Make it stop!  

Make it stop!  

Hmmmm...looks like Susan would like the annoying little flyouts to go away, too.

Come on, Patch developers, give us the option of disabling the flyouts.  As I asked before, WHY IS THIS SO HARD FOR YOU TO UNDERSTAND??

make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE 

make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE 

make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE 

make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE 

make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE 

make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE make it stop PLEASE 

Troy,

Could you perhaps please explain what it is Patch is trying to accomplish with the "Read More" pop-ups? If it is intended to draw attention to more stories on Patch, doesn't it make sense to offer a setting to disable it, so that its presence won't make people leave the site altogether?

It would seem *that* would increase pageviews more than anything.

I'm new to this site, and frankly, the pop-ups are so annoying that I probably will seldom come here.  If I have no control over such an intrusion, I don't want to be here.  There is enough content elsewhere without the blatant disregard for the potential target audience.  Rather than serving its advertisers, it is insuring a readership that is far less then it could be.  My life is too short to be annoyed!  Bye.

On 8/13/11 I agreed with this post and tried to express my displeasure being distracted while trying to read an article on Patch. It is clear so many other people have the same concern. Does anyone in the P. organization wonder how all these posts got up here? One would have to be so irritated that they would actually want to complain. They complain because they want something changed. They want it changed so they are not negatively affected when they use the P. website. They actually search for help and find this thread. Then, they add to this thread. Why would so many P. readers bother? I guess the P. techies know better than their users? They believe there's a certain number of us that are expendable? I have to say I've been back to P. about ten times in the last year. I've been on the SDUT (yuk) site about 100 and VOSD about 200 times in the last year. Go figure. READ: The last thing I want to see when I'm reading an article is a distracting, blinking, sliding whatever. These other guys don't have these *features*. I'm not against you making money or even trying to get me to notice other stories. But, please, do what the industry does - use words to attract us - not blinking, glowing, flashing or moving elements. I genuinely hate being distracted when I'm reading something. Please do let us know if you ever change this function because I'd love to not only read but, hopefully one day contribute to P. Who knows, I might even be exposed to some ads and shop at merchants that are supporting P?

I think the Patch developers have made their intentions pretty clear at this point, fellow site visitors.  They simply don't care if the site loses readership due to an easily-fixable error.  I guess they consider a certain number of readers (and supporters of their advertisers) to be expendable.  Since our concerns have fallen on deaf ears here, perhaps the way to get the point across would be to email the local businesses that advertise on the Patch, tell them that we won't be on the site anymore and tell them why.  When the paying customers (advertisers) realize they're losing viewers/potential customers, maybe they'll be able to get a little action out of the Patch honchos.