It's remarkable how many user-hostile annoyances and dark patterns of web design have gone mainstream.

Designers seem to have learned the wrong lessons. If users are blocking your pop-up windows (or other annoying features like autoplaying video) the proper response is to design your web site to work properly without the irritating features, not to come up with a new way of invoking them that works even in the face of powerful blocking mechanisms and user opposition.

One more reason for right click -> open in a new tab (on desktop). It's a surprisingly simple and effective solution. Edit: copy/paste link location also gets rid of the unwanted Javascript destination and should be safe.

The websites I really can't stand are the ones featuring href="#", only relying on Javascript for links.

Google does this for its search results. Hovering the cursor over it shows the actual URL of the result, but whenever it detects an onclick event it replaces it by its own tracking URL. Super annoying when trying to copy an URL - luckily you can easily get rid of it through user.js.

Just one of many reasons you should block js by default, and push back (usually by just leaving) sites that show blank pages without it.

On Firefox (Linux), middle-clicking opens a new tab to the site indicated, not the malicious one.