Garryck

I'd like to get some feedback here from both the site admins and the members.

Lately I've been seeing more and more of those Flash-based advertisements on the web. You know, the ones that float onto the screen and block the content behind them (there was one for Earth and Beyond on the Castersrealm EQ page all last week or so, for example).

To me these ads are just about as annoying as pop-ups, and as surfers I feel that you and I have the right to choose what we see and don't see when we surf.

So I've written a program that runs in your system tray that blocks Flash content from playing on your PC, no matter what browser you're using. You can right-click the system tray icon to temporarily enable Flash support, then left-click to once again disable it.

I've written it in such a way that you won't be prompted to re-download Flash or even get an ActiveX complaint (which you might have seen if you've ever tried to manually rip Flash out).

The Setup file for it is about 170kb in size so I can't host it on my own servers. I only have residential DSL and if this program gets popular (which I think it will once the word gets out) more than a few dozen downloads per hour would drop my whole external network to it's knees.

Anyway, I went to my two old stand-bys for file uploads and it did not go well. Download.com now charges developers minimum $49 US to upload a file, even if they are distributing their program as freeware (go figure - make the dev pay but the downloading person gets it free?). Tucows is up to an 8-10 week wait for hosting.

I can't put it on Fileplanet, WinFiles, etc. because they all use Flash advertising. hehe

As such I would love to have this program available here and a few other EQ-related sites, as most of us all surf a lot of the same sites that use Flash advertising. However, it doesn't fit into the "scope" of this site or any other EQ-type site. While it is loosely EQ-related (i.e. if you're reading this you're a web surfer - heh) it is not a UI tool, an EQ game tool, etc. It's on the fringe.

So, what does everyone think? I'm open to ideas.