Back in the Dark Ages I was a big fan of AOL and the fact that you still occasionally see a tagline at the end of some shows saying AOL Keyword-means that I was not alone. Back then there was Netscape and well, what else? Not much, as a web browser was not much use to people who had to use dial up to get online anyway-you just used your service provider.
But that was long ago-now the Browser Wars seem to be between Internet Explorer from Microsoft and Firefox from Mozilla. I tried Opera once or twice and found I didn’t like it much, though it brags of being the mean and lean browser. I use Firefox and have for sometime now. I was first attracted to Firefox as they didn’t have the popup problems that Explorer has been plagued with. The Wife, however, is an Internet Explorer fan and it is her browser of choice.
Now I am one of those people that would download a Ferrari if I could. As a result of my wanton habits of download, use, delete, and repeating, I have often had viruses, maleware, and one thing or another that has been a bother to get rid of. The latest of my attacks has been of the About:Blank variety, which forces redirects and pop-ups when you try to use Internet Explorer. I have tried many of the countless bits of advice to remove this very annoying bug, with no success in sight. The long and the short seems to be that I need to buy some very specific software to be rid of it, or do even more digging around in the registry in a vain attempt to find the hidden dlls that are really starting to piss me off.
So my question about Pop-Ups and Re-Directs has always been the same, does anyone actually sell anything by pissing people off? I understand that forced shut downs and deleted root directories are just flat out attacks, but Pop-Ups are ads and ads are supposed to make you want to buy something. The about:blank popups make me want to track down their creators and kill them.
So I have a whole suite a nice new programs designed to make my machine run better, and it does run a lot better now, but I still can’t use Explorer. I’m sure The Wife will come to love Firefox in the fullness of time.
Update-
After much gnashing of teeth and ripping of hair-what little I have-the mysterious about:blank hijacker has been removed from my pc.
