Though it's falling further and further behind mainstream browsers, Konqueror seems to take a principled stand on some of these things - I can still right-click on the github logo normally, and my keyboard isn't intercepted by flash plugins.

I think there's a small market for a browser (or browser plugin) that's all about client control. Querying mouse position, hijacking keypresses and showing popup windows and modal dialogs should be activated with a "This site tried to... Allow/Deny".

NoScript gets part of the way there, but I think you could go even further. Pages should display as soon as the HTML starts downloading, before CSS is loaded, before JS is all there, whatever. I don't care if this causes the page to jump a few times, or if it breaks a few scripts because it's not standards compliant, I just want to read my content on a slow connection.

I probably want to disable webfonts. They're a vanity thing, mostly, and the more I consider it the more I think I should be picking the fonts I read.

Maybe you could go even further - for specific sites with really atrocious interfaces you could have custom-written interfaces that almost completely remodel them (a'la Readability, I guess). I'm sure it would annoy web developers to have their pages render "incorrectly" on your screen, but screw them. My browser, my rules.

You and me both. Apparently I'm expected to go out and buy a new laptop with a middle mouse button so I can open new tabs properly.

Am i the only person who uses middle click(the scroll wheel button) to open a link in a new tab? This worked for the github icon too; i just checked (Opera 11.61/Linux)

To all that mentioning middle-click: what about when I want to open the main page in a new window? Or copy URL to the page? (sometimes it's faster to right-click on logo than to move up and copy-paste from address bar; also keyboard is not involved).

I'd say the best way would be to add a "No, I just want to get to the homepage!" option to the lightbox. No cookies or saving preferences, just a simple link.

But track how often that link is clicked, and if it really is a lot more than 1% of people, then you know it's a behaviour worth accounting for and can code in your preference tracking thing accordingly. If not, no time wasted.

Well I middle-click...

I'd guess that people who wants to open a link on a new tab but doesn't know how to middle-click or command + click is indeed a very small minority.

Requires two hands, but I often find it easier to control-click on links to open in a new tab, and that still works in this case.

The usual right-click menu works fine (using FF on linux).

On OS X, you can use Command-click for that.

Ctrl (or Cmd) Click, done.

yes