Mildly irritating web design

[mcity]

http://www.fimfiction.net

Pick a story. Any story. Now use your spacebar or Page Down to scroll. Notice anything?

Yes, that's right, that stupid bar always covers the first few lines. So you have to constantly scroll up to keep reading those few lines. There's a reason FF.net keeps those options parked at the top of the page, where they can't interfere.

And that's not the only usability flaw. The header takes up over half the vertical space of the screen, and there's no way to turn it off or minimize it that I've found. So if you're, say, in the options section, clicking a link to a new subsection means scrolling down every single time. It doesn't use AJAX to switch between sections without having to load a new page, but it does use Javascript to make what should be an unobtrusive page element obtrusive.

Sheesh.
-J

Comments

[degraine.livejournal.com]

I heartily hate most floating elements, especially the ones that lag behind and then 'catch up' when you scroll. It brings attention to them! Why?! I don't give a shit about reblogging, Facebook liking or tweeting! Stop trying to shill your shitty multipage article with flash ads plastered around the actual content!

[mcity.livejournal.com]

You don't use Adblock?

I'm not using it in Firefox, right now, but only because it glitched out when Firefox 11 rolled in.

[degraine.livejournal.com]

I use Opera, I've no idea if there's an Adblock for it (there probably is). And I understand why people have ads on their website, that's fair enough, although the multipage bullshit devalues the whole concept and hypertext in general and full motion video is where I draw the damn line. That's an unreasonable amount of bandwidth for someone who doesn't live in the hallowed lands of the US which, for better or worse, pretty much is the center of the world, in terms of the internets.

[mcity.livejournal.com]

https://addons.opera.com/en/addons/extensions/details/opera-adblock/0.52/