Enough! Web Pages Resembling Stock Cars

Software developers are a funny lot. I love them, don't get me wrong. These are the wonderful men and women who brought us word processing programs, Flickr, instant sports scores on the Web and much more.

But the popularity of new Web tools, plug-ins, social-networking tie-ins, bookmarks and favorites links is becoming too much.

Web pages are beginning to resemble NASCAR stock cars. Just as the race machines from the world's leading motorsports series are ridiculed for their preponderance of ads, logos and sponsor decals, so too should Web pages.

At what point do we stop? I recently visited a Web page that contained so many social networking, bookmark and favorites links it reminded me of a NASCAR racer's front fender! There were ad links. logos and buttons for a dizzying array of options, including Digg, Buzz, Adding To Google, Adding To Yahoo, RSS feeds, XML links, send to my cell phone options, etcetera.

Enough is enough!

Someday the shakeout will be complete and but a few (maybe a half-dozen?) links will essentially become standardized. Until then, browsing the Web will prove reminiscent of strolling the race track, pit lizards and all.