In Opera, there is an option to disable animations, too.

Also in Opera, you can choose to view only images that are already in cache. This often helps with advertising.

Another interesting option in Opera is the option to prohibit popup windows. I believe that in IE, this is only possible with 3rd. party tools.

WinProxy has an option to not download images from sites that look like banners. It includes templates similar to */banner/* and */ad/*.

This latter is not a free product. Perhaps something similar exists as freeware, but I don't know.

>>In IE, you can uncheck the "play animation in web pages" checkbox under the multimedia section of the advanced tab (tools/options).
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>Many thanks....that helps. (doesn't de-animate the CODE magazine ad though.., which maybe is a flash ad. )
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>I dunno, the whole advertising business model is on my nerves. I'm willing to pay to turn the damn things off. Its a little like the New York Times; I would be happy to pay a subscription fee to have access to animation-free pages, and to surpress pop-ups, as I realize they need to subsidize the the cost of the service. Slashdot was contemplating a system like that, I think, the more you paid, the fewer the ads in size, animation, and obnoxiousness.
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>Basically I've completely given up on commercial television and the so-called public broadcasting channels in the U.S. The only content that I was really interested in, we rented Six Feet Under as as a DVD.
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>The best coverage of our current little war I found came from the german ARD Tageschau, which broadcasts its newscasts over the net, entirely commercial free, with a beautiful interface, and excellent quality.