Annoyance, frustration, anger.

All these words come to mind when people think about pop-up windows, the most common mode of advertising on the Internet.

Computer users campus-wide say they are annoyed daily with pop-up advertising as they surf the web. Whether they advertise miniature cameras, cheaper airline tickets or lower mortgages, these unwanted windows open on a user's screen only to be closed seconds later. As a result, web surfers are constantly looking for a way to rid themselves of these advertisements.

Timothy Morales (freshman-division of undergraduate studies) expressed his annoyance with pop-up advertising.

"They are interrupting and pop up out of nowhere when you are trying to do something," he said. "Plus, they are always for stuff that nobody wants."

Since the Internet's creation, the volume of information posted on the Web has increased almost exponentially. A recent study found that more and more people are using the Internet as their primary source of information.

As a result, companies began banking on the trend. While some advertising on the web is done through banner advertising, ads already on the page, the majority of Internet advertising is done through pop-up windows. These unwanted new windows open themselves, sometimes non-stop, onto an unsuspecting surfer's desktop.

William Weightman (freshman-finance and international business) likened pop-ups to television commercials. "You are trying to surf the Web and you've got ads popping up in front of you. It's just like when the television show you are watching goes to a commercial break," he said. "It's just plain annoying."

Bernard Jansen, instructor in information sciences and technology, said while pop-ups may seem complicated to produce, they are merely a single line of code and can be altered easily.

"It's a single line in JavaScript code -- they are extremely easy to create. Like any Web page, once you design it you can animate it, attach sound, or change the picture. Their ease to create is what makes pop-ups so appealing to advertisers," he said.

Because pop-ups are so easy to make, they can cost only pennies per ad. As a result, advertisers can buy them in large quantities and have them posted frequently. Even if only one or two customers take advantage of the advertisements and buy from the company that posted the ad, the advertisers have already made their money back. Any buyers after the initial few add to the return on investment, which is the amount of money that an advertiser makes per ad, Jansen said.

Jansen questioned the effectiveness of pop-ups, saying that he does not know how truly effective these ads are in allowing surfers to make purchases. In some cases however, false positive clicking, which is when users click the window in the wrong place in an attempt to close it, can cause the large return on investment, he added.

"I've never ordered anything from a pop-up ad, I don't know anyone who has," Jansen said.

I'm sure someone has or they wouldn't keep doing them, and maybe it's because I'm not in the market for a video cam, don't want to refinance my house, or not want to online gamble. I'm sure they get some sales -- the cost is so low they don't need very many to break even."

In response to the irritation of pop-up ads, many software companies now offer programs that block these ads from appearing on a user's desktop. These types of software work by looking for certain coding in the programming of the window that signals pop-up advertising and then blocks that window from executing its code and opening on the desktop.

For the most part, software such as Symantec's Norton Internet Security is reliable and has less of a chance of causing configuration problems with the user's computer.

More wallet-friendly programs such as ZoneAlarm or other third-party software programs, which can be downloaded for free, also block pop-up ads but may not be able to block all of the ads. Depending on the user's needs a free shareware program may be all that is needed to ease the irritation of pop-ups.

In addition to software, other techniques can be used to reduce the deluge of pop-ups. Surfers can always increase their computer's Internet security options, but this may also hinder the viewing of legitimate web pages. In addition, on some sites hosted by www.geocities.com or www.tripod.com, if just one pop-up window is left open, all of the advertisements will open in that same window, reducing the clutter caused by subsequent ads.

Lately, many large online companies and Internet service providers like America Online, EarthLink and www.msn.com have banned pop-ups as a way to encourage new customers to subscribe to their services. Jansen said this could be a sign that pop-up ads may not be an Internet fixture for much longer.

Jansen explained that for the most part, pop-ups are a normal part of surfing the Internet, and while they may be annoying, they don't have a major impact on computer users.

"[Pop-ups] are annoying, but they aren't killing anybody. It's not like they totally hamper my creativity and productivity in a normal day," he said. "In order for pop-ups to be successful they need to make money and be supported by the big online companies and it appears that most of them are not."