the.com/popup
The internet's uninvited guest, arriving precisely when you least want it.
means A small window or box that appears suddenly on a screen, often unbidden, to display an ad, message, or prompt over the content you were actually trying to see.
from A plain compound of "pop" plus "up" — "pop" being an old imitative word for a quick, bursting sound or motion, the same one behind popcorn and popping corks. "Pop-up" first earned its keep in the physical world: pop-up books with paper scenes that spring upright when you turn the page, and pop-up toasters that fling your bread skyward. Computing borrowed the image wholesale in the late 20th century for menus and windows that leap into view, and the web later gave the word its modern, faintly resented flavor.
- first appearance
- Invented in the mid-1990s to hide ads from a webpage
- creator's regret
- Its inventor publicly apologized for the whole concept
- blocker arms race
- Browsers now ship with them blocked by default
- sneaky cousin
- Pop-unders hide behind windows to dodge blockers
- retail meaning
- Also a temporary shop that vanishes within weeks
popup book — first commercially successful pop-up by lothar meggendorfer in 1887
popup restaurant — noma pop-up in tokyo 2015, chef rené redzepi's temporary dining concept
popup store — supreme's first new york location in 1994, pioneering temporary retail