Bring Back Free Clicking

You may have noticed the new NYTimes.com feature where if you double-click on a word -- no matter if the word is "to" or "all" or whatever -- up pops a contextual dictionary to define it. That's great, I guess, unless you, like me, like to click around randomly while reading text online. In that case, the Times' website has become all-but-unusable.

Well, I'm not alone. Kriston Capps is launching his Bring Back Free Clicking campaign complete with snazzy logo. Download your own button and post it on your site. Join the crusade!

Comments

Wow, this has been annoying me for weeks, and I had no idea I wasn't the only person who did that! Thanks for making me feel like less of a freak.

Posted by dan | February 28, 2007 9:05 AM

Just use a pop-up blocker.

Posted by Umar | February 28, 2007 9:06 AM

What kind of browser are you freaks using?

In Safari, I've still got Free Clicking. No crusade for me. Those open source browsers seem to be working out great for you, though.

Posted by Petey | February 28, 2007 9:06 AM

OK, this works in Firefox anyway...

- Install Adblock from http://adblock.mozdev.org/. Restart Firefox.

- Go to the NYTimes site and view an article.

- Right-click the Adblock menu (bottom of the window) and select "List all blockable elements."

- Look for a SCRIPT that ends with "altClickToSearch.js" and block it.

Works for me. Adblock is your friend!

Posted by cisko | February 28, 2007 9:10 AM

I tried to click through to Kriston's site, but it was blocked by my admin, apparently it is pornographic. Thanks Matt!

Posted by vanya_6724 | February 28, 2007 9:10 AM

Seriously, what inspires you to randomly double-click on words? I can imagine a stray click here and there, but not double clicks.

Posted by Jeremiah J. | February 28, 2007 9:21 AM

I strongly recommend the Firefox extension NoScript which stops any site from running JavaScript unless you specifically request it. The vast majority of JavaScript does undesirable things like loading ads, popping up unwanted windows, or letting ogged spy on what links you're clicking. Use NoScript and you'll never even notice stuff like this.

By the way, Jeremiah, double-clicking on a word is supposed to select that word. And if you don't let go after the second click, you can drag to select the whole sentence or paragraph. It's very handy when you copy and paste a lot.

Posted by neil | February 28, 2007 9:28 AM

a plethora of useful information on this thread...i'll have to start taking notes.

Posted by looj | February 28, 2007 9:31 AM

"The vast majority of JavaScript does undesirable things like loading ads, popping up unwanted windows..."

...and making the "Post" and "Preview" buttons on this site work.

Posted by Petey | February 28, 2007 9:34 AM

"Seriously, what inspires you to randomly double-click on words?"

I prefer to read text on the NYT site highlighted. That is, I'll highlight the entire paragraph I'm reading, so that the text is white on a blue background. Much easier, for me. But then, a stray click (as when, for instance, I go to highlight the next paragraph and am a little bit careless in my aim because I'm finishing up the prior paragraph) means I get a bizarre definition.

I'm pretty sure I've had this problem on Safari at home, although I'll double check tonight. But for those of us corporate drones stuck with ie at work, all your workarounds are useless.

Posted by dan | February 28, 2007 9:39 AM

What would Bill Clinton see if he clicked on the word "is" I wonder?

Posted by Jeff | February 28, 2007 9:41 AM

If you think matthewyglesias.com's bot-filtering script represents 'the vast majority of JavaScript' then I can only say you should pay more attention to the majority of JavaScript.

Posted by neil | February 28, 2007 9:41 AM

Thought I was the only one who unconsciously clicked at random while reading online. I feel so much better knowing I'm not alone with this affliction!

Posted by adam | February 28, 2007 9:47 AM

"I'm pretty sure I've had this problem on Safari at home"

Nope. Not even if you turn off the built-in popup blocker.

(And, of course, the inimitable OmniWeb is Free Clickable as well. A word to the wise: if you run OS X and spend a lot of time on the web and aren't using OmniWeb as your main browser, well, there's something wrong with you.)

Posted by Petey | February 28, 2007 9:49 AM

Look up anything. Then when the window opens, look up "mustache of understanding."

Posted by Reality Man | February 28, 2007 10:06 AM

Heh. I thought I was the only one who did that.

Posted by Slippery Pete | February 28, 2007 10:32 AM

I'm glad I'm not the only person with this nervous tic... I was annoyed by this enough that I discovered the "altClickToSearch.js" script mentioned by an earlier poster -- blocking this script with AdBlock works a charm!

And, Reality Man: I am simply in awe.

Posted by Alex R | February 28, 2007 10:42 AM

highlighting text on your blog is next to impossible, so i find your support of this campaign a bit hypocritical.

Posted by niv | February 28, 2007 11:11 AM

Oh my god! I hate this new feature on the NY Times! I always like to double or triple click and highlight as I read and now I can't do that on the Times site. It is infuriating.

I'll have to take the advice of the other commenters and download an adblock. Jeez.

Posted by Paul | February 28, 2007 11:14 AM

Yes yes YES. While I read, I run around the page with my mouse, highlighting and clicking on chunks of text large and small. I've been very frustrated by the Times web page for this very reason, and I'm glad someone else is bothered by this. Frankly, the fact that some people don't understand the problem tells me they just don't know how to use the Internet.

Posted by Daniel | February 28, 2007 11:16 AM

I was reading the story about yesterdays stock market woes and saw reference to the city "Shenzhen". I had no idea where it was our why it was important to the stock market. With a double-click, I got my answer. I REALLY like that feature of the NYTimes.com.

I can click and highlite text all over the NY Times page without a problem. I think all y'all need to re-think how you use a mouse. You're double-clicking a little too much. Explore the wonders of the click-and-drag.

Posted by DanF | February 28, 2007 11:40 AM

Personally I think this feature is awesome. Probably because my vocabulary is smaller than yours.

Posted by Korha | February 28, 2007 11:47 AM

"Seriously, what inspires you to randomly double-click on words?"

Aeons spent editing text in Quark or InDesign. It's become a sort of tic. Although I'm still usually suprised when a triple click doesn't highlight a sentance or a quadruple click doesn't highlight a paragraph.

Posted by Ed Marshall | February 28, 2007 12:29 PM

I don't usually double click on words, I just click and drag to highlight text. It annoys all my friends when they are reading over my shoulder. Glad to hear that this is so common amongst matthewyglesias.com readers. :-)

Posted by Drew Miller | February 28, 2007 12:36 PM

There is an RSS reader for the NYT
http://nytimes.blogspace.com/

Posted by Alice | February 28, 2007 2:05 PM

Instead of NoScript, use NoScriptPainfulShock. If the developer is online.... It's much more fun.

Also good is NoScriptShockinglyLoudScreamingGuy.

Posted by jerry | February 28, 2007 2:08 PM

"Seriously, what inspires you to randomly double-click on words? I can imagine a stray click here and there, but not double clicks."

It is a standard UI gesture in all text display programs (browsers, word processors, etc) that double clicking a word selects a word so that you can copy it. This is faster than drag-clicking the word. The fact that NY Times has overridden such a standard interface gesture is inexcusible. It suggests that they do not really care how users interact with their site.

Posted by Walker | February 28, 2007 2:32 PM

Wow, get real. You want them to disable what might well be a helpful feature just because you have ADD? Jeeeez. Why not just adjust Firefox not to accept popups from nytimes.com?

Instead you have to start a really stupid campaign? I'm in awe. Dumbest thing a bloggers has done in, well, hours. But it's pretty dumb.

Posted by Martin | February 28, 2007 2:38 PM

Frankly, the fact that some people don't understand the problem tells me they just don't know how to use the Internet.

Actually, it means that the New York TImes didn't do enough (or possibly any) user testing before they rolled out the new feature. I do some work in human-computer interaction, on the theoretical side, and there's no way I would have foreseen this difficulty--but that's the point of usability testing.

(Kudos for people who have figured out how to turn it off, but the solutions indicate another usability issue the site didn't address: "Oh, you don't like the on-by-default pop-up definitions? Think of it as an ad you're blocking, and just in case, here's a bit of JavaScript jargon you may find useful." That's fine for many people, but probably not for everyone.)

Posted by RSA | February 28, 2007 2:43 PM

It is totally foreseeable.

It is a pretty common UI gesture dawning from the very early days in GUIs to double-click on a single word to select it, and then *without releasing the mouse on the second click*, drag-select. This allows one to select sentences, paragraphs etc (anything starting on a word boundary) *without having to aim* for the exact first character in the passage (see Fitt's Law). It's tremendously valuable (particularly in web browsers where selection behavior is kinda funky), and lots of people do it even without thinking. The Times's "feature" breaks this workflow for negligible added value.

Posted by Iván | February 28, 2007 3:00 PM

YES! I hate the NY Times new popup thing and I habitually click on words and paragraphs while reading things.

Posted by Alec Brandon | February 28, 2007 4:57 PM

Color me perplexed why or how anyone could or would read while double-clicking on random words. If doing it intentionally, the only reason I could imagine would be to copy and paste the single word in order to paste it into Google to do a search, but it would seem that double-clicking on the NYTimes starts that process for you without having to paste. It can't be that much more difficult to just click-drag-highlight the word if you want to copy it, and if you want to copy a series of words, sentence(s), or paragraph(s) it is the rare software program (not a common software program) that will let you triple or quadruple click up to that.

I don't even hold the mouse when I'm reading lengthy articles...doesn't seem to make sense and it's not really that good for you to hold your hand in that position for extended periods of time anyway. Short blog entries might be another story, but I'd have no reason to click on anything nervously or otherwise unless I wanted to copy and paste into a search engine, and it's just as easy to click and drag as double-click for experienced users.

I don't read the NY Times online, but if I did, and double-clicked a word to copy it, I'd probably learn after the second or third time to just click and drag on that particular site. In any case, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't complain about it, since very few casual users from my experience (as a UI engineer among other things) know or remember the double-click highlight of a single word technique to begin with, and I've done thousands of hours of requirements gathering, UI engineering, user testing, etc. For the masses, I'd say this is probably a neat new feature for casual users who notice and learn the technique.

Posted by Jimm | February 28, 2007 5:46 PM

I've noticed that too. God it's so fucking irritating!

Posted by Chad Okere | February 28, 2007 7:30 PM

Color me perplexed why or how anyone could or would read while double-clicking on random words. If doing it intentionally, the only reason I could imagine would be to copy and paste the single word in order to paste it into Google to do a search, but it would seem that double-clicking on the NYTimes starts that process for you without having to paste.

I click and highlight text randomly when I read it online. I don't know why I do it, I just do. I've noticed a couple other people hightlight stuff as they read too. There's no reason. But I have to remember not to click on something when I'm reading then NYT, usually after I close a popup.

Posted by Chad Okere | February 28, 2007 7:32 PM

DanF-
Sure. But for that one article out of a hundred where you need a definition, hitting command-K (on a mac anyway) and typing "Shenzhen" would have taken about three seconds longer. The added annoyance factor is a lot less defensible given that there's already an incredibly easy, non-annoying way to get more information about a given term.

Posted by Julian Sanchez | February 28, 2007 8:06 PM

Yes! I agree! I thought I was the only one who does that..

Posted by PaulF | February 28, 2007 9:09 PM

I was completely unaware that I did, in fact, randomly click all over the screen while reading until quite recently, thanks to the NYT.

Posted by djw | March 1, 2007 3:19 AM

Wow, some of you mad clickers are just begging for carpal tunnel syndrome.

Posted by Steve LaBonne | March 1, 2007 1:47 PM

Hi -- I wrote a greasemonkey (firefox plugin) script that stops just this bit of the javascript on the NYT web site from running.
http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/7721

earl

Posted by Earl | March 1, 2007 5:30 PM

Too rich.

I came here to lodge a complaint against your hypocracy, but found that "niv" had beaten me to it:

"highlighting text on your blog is next to impossible, so i find your support of this campaign a bit hypocritical."

Fix this, Matthew, we beg you. For the sake of the pathological highlighters, for all of the copy-and-pasters...

Bring Back Free Highlighting.

Posted by Dan | March 1, 2007 6:37 PM

I third. Part of my random clicking involves draging and highlighting random bits of text, or maybe the paragraph I'm reading. I don't even notice that I'm doing it any more. But here, when I highlight and nothing seems to happen, this sub-conscious activity becomes a conscious speed bump. I generally consider this to be my problem, but as we're talking about handicapping the random clicker anyway....

Posted by Lance | March 2, 2007 1:33 PM

To be a bit more specific, the highlighting only seems to be an issue in the Windows version of Firefox.

I primarily use Firefox on my Mac at home, and have no problem with it there. It's only in Firefox on the Windows shit-box I use at work that I'm forced to endure this horror.

Matt, if you're still reading, I implore you to check your site out on a PC and then bring back free highlighting.

Posted by Dan | March 3, 2007 2:32 PM