So an ad which will drain conservative money into this websites coffers is just too damned much for your delicate sensibilities, but you have no problem when every post on this website links to wingnuttery in order to mock it. Seriously, not only are you whiny shits, you’re stupid as hell. If the Newsmax ad upsets you so much, I recommend you stop going to Wonkette or any of the other dozens of liberal sites running it.
I’ll put up a separate post so you can each write your GBCW comment in the thread, and the rest of us with the business sense of a five year old or better can point and laugh. And don’t ever let me hear the words “epistemic closure” coming from you again, if an ad is too much for you to bear.
Oh, and you bitched so god damned much before we could even fix the new layout that the designer just said “Fuck it” and reverted back to the old site. Oh, and that new site- it contained or was to contain all the god damned changes you’ve been bitching about that you needed for the past two years. Morans.
Ivan X
I must be reading Balloon Juice.
Christian Sieber
Nothing like some good old John Cole to kick off my Sunday morning the right way. :)
Short Bus Bully
This is what you get for building a site that caters to teh olds. They bitch and moan about change whether it’s an improvement or not.
Continue the education of the AOL Krew JC, they obviously need it.
Xenos
Hey! I was going to click on those Newsmax ads and then troll their sites. Entertainment and income generation for BJ at the same time.
Where is the anarchist spirit around here?
Mezz (fpa Michael2)
It’s that intimate feeling of community, of love, that makes this my favorite site.
I’m totally seriously.
trollhattan
I am a proud Moran-American, sir! Your deliberate misspelling offends me and my fellow Morans.
j
I really like the new type-face. It’s cool.
Ted & Hellen
Not a surprising reaction from a commentariat dominated by cranky ass Nixon Republicans who fantasize themselves to be liberals.
BarbCat
The perks of being a slacker and/or wasting my time on a thread extolling the virtues of my Simon Garfunkel Library: I missed the whole thing.
Just Some Fuckhead
Everyone here is ruining it for me and you, John. I don’t know how much longer I can put up with it.
Comrade Mary
John, you rock. I missed the big roll-out last night because I was actually Outside.
For those of us with the business sense of a 6 year old, can you please bring in the new site anyway?
Elizabelle
Didn’t even have to wonder who authored this post.
TaMara (BHF)
Ok, FIRST of all, 3 people complained about the ad and I think we mocked them mercilessly.
SECOND – if you’re talking about last night’s post where we were subject to the ever changing column widths and font sizes. I didn’t see anyone bitching. We were having fun. I think everyone knew what was going on and took it in stride and made jokes and went with it.
Geez Cole, you and your web designer need to toughen up.
Or, if this is easier to understand: Fuck you.
cathyx
I’m happy to say that I was complimenting the changes not complaining about them, but to just give up and go back to the old design is kind of childish and overly sensitive.
Josie
Okay – I recognize this ploy from my mothering years – the punishing guilt trip. “You boys have made such a mess in here that I’m not going to make you that yummy chocolate cake that I was planning.”
Bill E Pilgrim
It looks like I picked the right few days to check in on this blog again. This is one nutty hospital. And I mean that as a compliment.
Now I want to go back to yesterday and read the complaining, but I think actually just imagining it from this post is more entertaining.
MikeBoyScout
Happy Mother’s day Mrs. Cole!
TR
If you kids don’t quiet down right now, John is going to turn this blog around and head home! HE MEANS IT THIS TIME TOO!
piratedan
That’s Mister Moron to you sir! Now Good Day, I said Good Day!
optional harumph to be inserted here
joe gamba
@Ivan X: makes my Mutha’s Day. Thank you!!
Amir Khalid
Ooh! I love a good custard-pie fight!
But I haz a sad because I never even saw the Newsmax ad people are arguing about. (Who is Mr Newsmax, anyway, and what is he selling?)
Unsympathetic
GET OFF MY LAWN, THAT BALL IS MINE NOW
Wait here while I finish downloading a grainy .jpg of Alyssa Milano I found on a BBS through my CompuServe dialup.
geg6
Heh. No complaining here, Cole. Since my laptop is borked, I’ve been reading on my mobile: no site change and no ads.
Don’t get the bitching about the ads anyway. Can’t believe anyone pays attention to them.
am
People have a real, legitimate opportunity to siphon money from a right wing to a progressive site, and are complaining about it? I click through every Newsmax ad that ever’s been run on B-J. It’s like donating with matching funds from the Koch Foundation.
How dumb.
Ash Can
Like we discussed in the previous thread — if you had been paying any attention — the Newsmax ad looks like something YOU PUT THERE YOURSELF. It wasn’t a matter of “We don’t like the ad content,” it was a matter of “Why the fuck do you guys feel the need to put a link to fucking Newsmax in a prominent position on the page?” If we make your ass so damned tired for thinking that something that looks identical to other features you put on the site yourself is in fact something that, you know, you put there yourself, then fucking ban us and get it over with and make the blog a much happier place from now on.
Good fucking grief.
TaMara (BHF)
JSF, if you missed it earlier, I wished you a happy birthday. Instead of cake, might I suggest popcorn for today’s festivities?
andy
I don’t see a NewsMax ad- I see ads for a place that hawks camera equipment and for Jeep…
am
@Ash Can:
That “What’s This?” link at the bottom left of the widget could have helped.
EZSmirkzz
I can haz cheeseburger now?
BarbCat
BTW, anyone else like the pairing of a title from yesterday’s posts, “Iâm a Jackass” with today’s, “You People are Morons”? Pinot Grigio or Burgundy dear?
Mnemosyne
Actually, the ad people are complaining about is still here and is still masquerading as blog content, so switching back to the old layout did … absolutely nothing to address the issue.
I don’t mind ads that are ads, because I can skim past them, but I resent ads that pretend to be posts by the front pagers at the blog I’m reading. The only thing the Newsmax ad is missing is the little arrow in front of each link.
And, no, I’m not one of the people who blocks all ads (I only block Flash). I just clicked on a Bob’s Red Mill ad because I want the algorithm to show me ads I’m interested in, not right-wing crap.
Just Some Fuckhead
@TaMara (BHF): I saw that. You are very kind. Too busy today to enjoy the blather. I’ll be outside most of the day, trimming the hedges, getting the sprinklers working, fixing the brakes on the truck and keeping an eye out for Stuck.
RepubAnon
@Ted & Hellen: The sad thing is that Nixon Republicans are today’s Islamo-Socialist peril… I’m sure the Tea Party folks are already claiming Nixon was really a Democrat. (After all, they claim Hitler was a socialist.)
Emdee
I last looked at the site around 4AM ET and missed any changes. Are there screen shots so I can complain too?
(Just name all of the site’s styles with names starting with “bjuice-” and we can make our own user style sheets and customize to our heart’s content. Fonts, colors, layout, whatever. That would be a wonderful experience in a] anarchy, and b] exploding Cole’s head)
WereBear
@Ash Can: Ads are capable of reading the CSS and then blending in with site or blog it is on.
It’s kinda evolution and kinda that horror film, Mimic, which I have an inexplicable fondness for.
scav
@Mnemosyne: Course not. Very likely the ad formatting is designed to mimic/steal/work using the defaults for the main site. It’s a ploy for links, not under John et al’s control was my assumption at least.
Mnemosyne
@scav:
I actually didn’t notice it at first because I never use the Recent Posts links, but I understand what people are annoyed about. There may not be anything that John can do about this specific ad, but he can let his ad company know that the format of the ads they’re sending is annoying his readers.
Roger Moore
OBAMACOLE IS WORSE THANBUSHOBAMA HE SOLD US OUT!!c u n d gulag
Oh, he’s SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO cute when he gets mad!!!
poptaracus
Your mean
The Other Chuck
I liked the new look, it was just the right-hand column squished all the content into a narrow column in the center. Seemed something easy enough to fix without having to revert everything back.
Oh, and it’s not the ad people were bitching about, it’s the deceptive appearance of the ad. I guess you need to run big animated graphical banner ads, maybe some good old popups, just so people know it’s an ad ;)
xian
@RepubAnon: the sad thing is that purity trolls are functionally indistinguishable from stochastic, fellow travelling, useful-idiot ratfuckers.
also, too, http://w3.newsmax.com/newsletters/brownstein/video_cancer.cfm?promo_code=11604-1&utm_source=11604BALLOON_JUICE&utm_medium=nmwidget&utm_campaign=widgetphase1
Roger Moore
@Ash Can:
This. I have never complained about all the damn Newsmax ads before, but it’s always wrong to disguise ads as editorial material. Make it clear that they’re ads, and I’ll be happy if you can extract enough money from Newsmax to run the whole damn site and leave enough left over for you to quit your day job.
cathyx
I don’t get the big complaint about the News Max ads. If you know they’re just ads, just ignore them. If you’re not sure, google the headline and see if the topic pops up somewhere else. Why do they need to change?
djork
What do mean by you people?
Keith
Somebody wants some thicker skin from Santa Claus this year!
Ash Can
@WereBear:
@scav:
Thanks for the info. And, ew.
@Mnemosyne: It’s not even the format of the ad per se that I object to the most. It’s the fact that mistermix and Cole, instead of simply saying, “No, that thing right under the ‘Recent Posts’ box that looks exactly like the ‘Recent Posts’ box is not something we put there ourselves, it’s an ad,” storm in here with “YOU MORANS WHY CAN’T U SEE THAT’S AN AD!!elebenty11” Fuck that shit.
Mnemosyne
@Ash Can:
I also love the temper tantrum-induced switching back to the old format, which only made the ad transform to the old formatting and didn’t actually do anything at all to address the actual complaint. So who’s the moron here, again?
Joey Maloney
Now that’s the John Cole I know and love.
Librarian
I didn’t notice anything wrong last night, but the post headlines just now changed fonts.
dance around in your bones
@John Cole
I guess you weren’t around last night for the whip-lash changes? There was no warning, everyone got confused and it was like we had all dropped the brown acid and didn’t know it.
By all means, encourage your web designer to carry on with the changes – I cannot believe s/he could be such a delicate flower. I mean, didn’t you warn him/her?
Oh, and bring back the old header, rotatting tag lines and the links at the bottom of the page to last and next posts. I promise I won’t bitch about the Newsmax thingamajoo ever ever again.
Eric U.
I never saw the newsmax ad, and I was reading the thread with people whining about it in real-time. My only complaint was that the font was too small, but most of us olds know about ctrl-mousewheel anyway
Cermet
Balloon-Juice readership – so many whinners that they should have their own club but one, I hope, elsewhere … I want all the money sent here that right wingers have to offer. Talk about the best of both worlds. If only the cock sucker brothers would add their money then this would be a dream site for the left. John, there is just too much ‘stupid’ here to believe.
Cermet
@Roger Moore: Damn! That’s a win!
scav
@Eric U.: Depended a lot on the platform you were reading it on, and you could make it do wonky things even on (at least some of) the “good” platforms if you resized the windows. Not an unusual issue exactly — hard to pretest for completely, but entire site being essentially unusable on a half-year old ipad? Bit bad. Funnier than hell all comments being one-word wide stacks in an ocean of white, box quotes invisible except for the front oversize quote marks and all the side columns pushed entirely below the comments.
Tim in SF
Complaining about right-wing ads is fucking retarded.
If you see a right-winger ad on a site you love, for God’s sake CLICK ON IT. The right winger PAYS for that click! And part of the money goes to the site you love.
By doing this, the sites you hate FUND the sites you love.
It’s a WIN-WIN! How many of those are there, these days?
Get busy clicking!
Ruckus
newsmax has to mislead in any way they can to get any one with more than 2 working brain cells to take them seriously. Other than clicking through for ad money why would anyone read their crap? OK maybe to point and mock but otherwise?
If you don’t like ads use adblock. If you don’t want to do that…
I mean I like a bitch fest as much as the next person but what is actually the point? OK I see that getting JC mad is fun enough in itself but past that?
Redshirt
Fuck all y’all.
Svensker
Hey, I didn’t complain. Can I get a cookie?
Shortstop
How is it possible to read “NEWSMAX HEADLINES,” scan the actual headlines below it, and still think this might be BJ content? I’m thinking someone +8 might fall for it, but I can’t find any other explanation for confusion.
Xenos
It can be fun to go to Newsmax. They have an article on impeaching Obama for Benghazi, and it does not mention the word ‘crime’, nor does any of the 170 comments. Pretty amusing look at the post-botched-lobotomy population.
Citizen_X
Oh good, angry-daddy Cole is back. I much prefer him to weepy-supportive-mommy Cole. Give us some discipline, John!
Shortstop
@Svensker: I just baked some chewy chocolate-cherry ones. As soon as they cool, first ones are yours.
28 Percent
That draining the coffers of the stupid into mine thing is why I bought stock in Ruger. Finally, I’m on the good side of a wealth transference with the Teatard crowd.
dance around in your bones
@Tim in SF:
Sigh. I guess I’ll mosey over to a browser I rarely use and click my ass off. The things we do for love of Balloon Juice.
I use AdBlock on Firefox primarily for security reasons (ads – malware!) and because I never buy anything online but books, anyway.
eta: Just clicked on 9 Newsmax headlines, so there’s yer nickel.
Luci
Hot Damn! I’ve not been so chewed out since I was in sixth grade and had the teacher from hell… Good times!!! ;) However, I missed all that uproar over the ad, and it was nice to catch up on what was going on. AND I did not know that clicking on those bad ads takes money from the Wingers. Guess I’ll be doing more clicking on them from now on, so put on as many as you want. :) I already always go to Amazon from this site, so….
Maude
I don’t care about the News Max bit. I don’t click on it.
Bring back the tech. She is great.
She knows people whine and she can ignore it.
I hope the new theme is like the old theme.
I like jackass better than moron. Seems more fitting somehow.
Calming Influence
The designer’s fee fees were hurt by a bunch of late-night +3 comments from the not-ready-for-polite-society Balloon Juice peanut gallery?
Nope, no whiny 2 year olds here…
Ultraviolet Thunder
Didn’t I say last night that Cole was going to come down and chew us all a new one over the complaining over the site changes? That’s right, I did. Exactly 14.5 hours ago.
different-church-lady
When are you ever going to learn to not move the food bowl, Cole?
Calming Influence
Cole, I think your web designers need to go through a sort of boot camp. Perhaps eight weeks of Christopher Walken reading Just Some Fuckhead’s comments in their ear through a bullhorn.
For graduation they have to be able to walk up to a sweet 80 year old grandmother and tell her to go fuck herself.
Calming Influence
@Ultraviolet Thunder: I remember it like it was yesterday…
Meyerman
I, for one, welcome our new Newsmax overlords!
NotMax
From jackass to ox to jackass within 48 hours.
Impressive.
Robert
It takes a pretty stupid person to not notice that the Newsmax ad:
A) Said Newsmax on top
B) Was formatted completely different from the Balloon Juice feed (Balloon Juice was bullet point list, Newsmax was not a bullet point list and had a different font size)
C) Had ridiculous wingnutty titles that should have been a dead giveaway that it wasn’t Balloon Juice content.
If you’re dumb enough to click on a really clear ad and be whisked away to another site, you’re probably dumb enough to reply back to e-mails about million dollar inheritance checks coming your way if you provide a checking account, a routing number, your social security number, and your mother’s maiden name.
Anne Laurie
@different-church-lady:
Corrected, for accuracy.
LT
Hey, the site looks good, nice job.
Sawgrass Stan
Actually, it’s nice to have this confirmed, so thanks to John C. for telling us, even if it’s in such a splattery, getoffmylawn-ery fashion.
Fuck you too, John, and thanks for letting us know that every click for Noosemax buys treats for Tunch, Lily, and Rosie.
(PS– I asked about this years ago, and yes, John, it’s NOT TOO MUCH to remind people that having Wingers pay the bills is a fucking good idea. SO, seriously, thanks, and seriously, fuck you too, in the nicest possible way.)
Mnemosyne
@Shortstop:
Right now, one of the headlines is “Justice Ginsberg: Roe v Wade May Be Too Sweeping.” I can think of at least a couple of firebaggers who would read that and start bemoaning Obama’s perfidy without bothering to follow the link.
ETA: Also, too, I despise ads that pretend to be content just on general principles. YMMV.
John Cole
@LT:
You just made the list, buddy.
Joseph Nobles
Bonsai ads? God damn, is nothing sacred anymore? (wait, what does GCBW mean…)
Whew, I have nothing at all to say about the General Committee of Bahrain Workers.
Shortstop
@Mnemosyne: Because they’re dumb enough to think Obama nominated Ginsburg?
You’re not making much of a case here.
dance around in your bones
@John Cole:
Was that in a good way or a bad way? Hey, I said nice things about certain aspects of the half-upgrade!
Has the web designer given up or are we to expect further embellishments?
LT
@John Cole: List? Is it presents list?!
Gopher2b
This is why we can’t have nice things.
LeftCoastTom
Huh? I was out wine tasting, guess I missed something.
Mnemosyne
@Shortstop:
Have you dealt with any of the firebagger trolls? They’re dumb enough to think Obama nominated Scalia, FFS.
But, like I said, my peeve is more that I hate ads that masquerade as editorial content. We have enough problems with that at the local newspaper, don’t need it online, too.
VodkaGoGo
I mostly just lurk over here but I’m always amazed at how many people come here seemingly just to bitch and moan at the front-pagers over anything and everything. It’s a free site. If you don’t want to read Newsmax, don’t click the link. Also too, start your own fucking blog.
shepherdwong
@Calming Influence: I know. I don’t even use “Fuck It” with my pro bono pain-in-the-ass clients (almost never, anyway).
Baud
@VodkaGoGo:
To be fair, there are those who bitch out of love, and those who bitch out of spite, and they often sound exactly the same. But they’re not.
Msskwesq
@trollhattan: I too am from a proud Moran clan. I get the misspelling joke but its getting old and on my nerves.
kc
Ooh, I love it when you talk like that …
mclaren
Adblock, bitches.
JAFD
If I may toss in my $0.02:
He who pays the server power bills picks the website design. Go to it.
IMHO, the new headline font doesn’t work very well. Too much contrast between heavy and light strokes, and too heavy serifs. Gets blurry at a distance (OK, my old glasses were progressive trifocals, new ones just bi, finding comfortable posture with this laptop a hassel is.)
PLEASE keep a long blogroll – that’s why I have Balloon Juice at the top of my bookmark list and start my ‘news and views’ reading here. But do note that some of the links need updating.
Don’t mind the ads, tho I very very seldom clickthru them. Life is too short and my blood pressure high enough already.
Stay loose!