I wish I could hand out violation tickets on the web. But since I can’t, I think I’ll rant a little instead.

I don’t know about you, but I get really annoyed when a designer decides to resize your browser window for you.

Why does this annoy me, I asked myself? Am I being unreasonable?

Well, I guess the answer is that I am selfish. After all, I’m the one who chose to use Firefox instead of Safari. I’m the one who chose to go Apple instead of Dell. I installed my own RAM. I installed my own wireless router. I’m in control here, I know what I’m doing. I parse out my screen real estate carefully when I am working. I’ve got a browser window shoved here, a text editor on the other side, Flash windows and palettes all over the place (that’s another UI story), chat windows, email… No wonder I feel stingy with my screen space.

My screen space: that says it right there. I feel proprietary. I’ve gone to the trouble to arrange all my windows just so… and then some cocky designer decides to take control of my desktop and mess it all up for me. Why, I ask you, Mister-or-Mizz designer? Because you authored a Flash presentation that’s 871 pixels wide, and you want to make sure there’s enough white space around it to make it look like Yoko Ono’s living room?

OK, rant over. Thanks for listening. I feel much better now.