
Hover a mouse over a link – just don't trust the results - phr4ts
https://www.michaelhorowitz.com/HoverOverLink.php
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musicale
It's remarkable how many user-hostile annoyances and dark patterns of web
design have gone mainstream.

Designers seem to have learned the wrong lessons. If users are blocking your
pop-up windows (or other annoying features like autoplaying video) the proper
response is to design your web site to work properly without the irritating
features, not to come up with a new way of invoking them that works even in
the face of powerful blocking mechanisms and user opposition.

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aruggirello
One more reason for right click -> open in a new tab (on desktop). It's a
surprisingly simple and effective solution. Edit: copy/paste link location
also gets rid of the unwanted Javascript destination and should be safe.

The websites I really can't stand are the ones featuring href="#", only
relying on Javascript for links.

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m463
I always right click->copy and put it in the url for a new tab before
deciding.

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Tilian
Google does this for its search results. Hovering the cursor over it shows the
actual URL of the result, but whenever it detects an onclick event it replaces
it by its own tracking URL. Super annoying when trying to copy an URL -
luckily you can easily get rid of it through user.js.

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musicale
It is extremely annoying. When I do a web search, I want real URLs, not
obfuscated tracking links, but search engines seem to have collectively
decided to sabotage their own search results.

Even if you are addicted to tracking (and assuming that tracking is a good
thing that users actually want) surely there is a way to do it without
sabotaging URLs.

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HocusLocus
Just one of many reasons you should block js by default, and push back
(usually by just leaving) sites that show blank pages without it.

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m463
a lot of "blank pages" yield a readable article if you click reader mode.

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tincholio
On Firefox (Linux), middle-clicking opens a new tab to the site indicated, not
the malicious one.

