Should Webmasters Resist Google's Push For AMP Pages? (polemicdigital.com) 190
"Have you heard of Google AMP? That stands for Accelerated Mobile Pages, and it's a way of making webpages so that they load faster and display more efficiently on mobile devices. Oh, and it puts your website under Google's control."
That's Mac Observer co-founder Bryan Chaffin, linking to an "interesting reading" titled "Google AMP Can Go To Hell." AMP allows Google to basically take over hosting the web as well. The Google AMP Cache will serve AMP pages instead of a website's own hosting environment, and also allow Google to perform their own optimisations to further enhance user experience. As a side benefit, it also allows Google full control over content monetisation. No more rogue ad networks, no more malicious ads, all monetisation approved and regulated by Google. If anything happens that falls outside of the AMP standard's restrictions, the page in question simply becomes AMP-invalid and is ejected from the AMP cache -- and subsequently from Google's results. At that point the page might as well not exist any more....
The easy thing to do is to simply obey. Do what Google says. Accept their proclamations and jump when they tell you to. Or you could fight back. You could tell them to stuff it, and find ways to undermine their dominance. Use a different search engine, and convince your friends and family to do the same. Write to your elected officials and ask them to investigate Google's monopoly. Stop using the Chrome browser. Ditch your Android phone. Turn off Google's tracking of your every move. And, for goodness sake, disable AMP on your website.
Don't feed the monster -- fight it.
Here's how web developer Macieg Ceeglowski put it in 2015. "Out of an abundance of love for the mobile web, Google has volunteered to run the infrastructure, especially the user tracking parts of it." But are these assessments too harsh? Leave your own thoughts in the comment.
Should webmasters resist Google's push for AMP pages?
That's Mac Observer co-founder Bryan Chaffin, linking to an "interesting reading" titled "Google AMP Can Go To Hell." AMP allows Google to basically take over hosting the web as well. The Google AMP Cache will serve AMP pages instead of a website's own hosting environment, and also allow Google to perform their own optimisations to further enhance user experience. As a side benefit, it also allows Google full control over content monetisation. No more rogue ad networks, no more malicious ads, all monetisation approved and regulated by Google. If anything happens that falls outside of the AMP standard's restrictions, the page in question simply becomes AMP-invalid and is ejected from the AMP cache -- and subsequently from Google's results. At that point the page might as well not exist any more....
The easy thing to do is to simply obey. Do what Google says. Accept their proclamations and jump when they tell you to. Or you could fight back. You could tell them to stuff it, and find ways to undermine their dominance. Use a different search engine, and convince your friends and family to do the same. Write to your elected officials and ask them to investigate Google's monopoly. Stop using the Chrome browser. Ditch your Android phone. Turn off Google's tracking of your every move. And, for goodness sake, disable AMP on your website.
Don't feed the monster -- fight it.
Here's how web developer Macieg Ceeglowski put it in 2015. "Out of an abundance of love for the mobile web, Google has volunteered to run the infrastructure, especially the user tracking parts of it." But are these assessments too harsh? Leave your own thoughts in the comment.
Should webmasters resist Google's push for AMP pages?
No Dictators -- None -- Zero (Score:3)
Dictators do not work for industry or countries.
Dictators -- they ain't what they used to be (Score:5, Interesting)
Dictators do not work for industry or countries.
They used to, sometimes. But modern dictators ain't what they used to be. ;-)
In the Roman Republic (emphasize Republic, after the kings, before the emperors) the dictator had a temporary appointment and absolute authority limited to the territory in crisis, for example a region with active warfare. An interesting story:
Rome was invaded. The Senate appointed a man named Cincinnatus dictator for six months. On his first day he appointed a military commander and ordered all able bodied males in Rome to report for military service. The next day they marched to meet the enemy. He outmaneuvered the enemy and put them in a very bad position, they begged for mercy. The deal was to execute the top three enemy leaders and grant amnesty to the bulk of the enemy army. Cincinnatus then disbanded his Roman army and resigned the dictatorship. He was dictator for about two weeks and then returned to his farm outside of Rome.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:3)
Dictators do not work for industry or countries.
Too late, you missed the fact that companies can basically steal and lock down products from the safety of their offices and extract "tribute" from the masses. This happened to videogames. Ultimately all the big videogame companies are looking to lock software inside the "cloud".
You'd need physical proximity to the business to force companies to give you the software you are paying for. They can just steal it and call it a service.
To call a society where the big software companies make software and never
Hell yes (Score:5, Insightful)
And their font servers. And Google Analytics. And their "free" dns. Fuck Google tracking everything everyone does online.
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No, fuck the shitty web sites which have dozens of ad servers and mouse tracking and other shit that make
websites use 150meg + of RAM.
Filter those ads out and the website uses under 10meg.
This is why so many websites fail/crash under older iPads and make them useless, thus driving sales of new hardware. Filter those ads out, and bingo, suddenly, all websites work real well on 5 year old iPads.
Fucking useless coders adding so much useless over head that does nothing for the user.
Googles trackers are super li
Re: Hell yes (Score:2, Informative)
The ISP I work for used to provide DNS with our broadband. We did no capture or logging of any kind of customer queries, nor did we alter results in any way, just pure caching anycast resolvers. As cached results didn't hit transit or peering at all, it was also faster than using Google. However, more and more customers started using Google DNS after word of mouth claimed it was faster (in some situations it is, sure) Eventually we dropped providing broadband, but the anecdotal "Google is always faster" sti
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Assuming ISPs actually do that. Which I seriously doubt in regions with tough privacy laws. Google just hides behind layers and layers legal declarations that snake through multiple jurisdictions.
On top of that, Google runs everything in this scenario. They have access to much more data and they do collect as much as they can. They control web sites and they shape what you get to see. If they don't like what they see, you as a user won't get to see it either.
Re: Hell yes (Score:3)
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And CenturyLink still does this, which is why I run my own DNS servers elsewhere and do a IPSec tunnel to them, to keep CenturyLink from mucking up how DNS is supposed to work ( I have CenturyLink as my DSL provider currently).
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In the UK they legally have to log. Google doesn't because it's not an ISP.
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GDPR
No, the Russians gave you BREXIT, if you want to have those kinds of protections you're going to need to finally figure out what is supposed to be in your Constitution and write it down so that all your rights can't be changed with a random 50%+1 poll.
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[Y]ou're going to need to finally figure out what is supposed to be in your Constitution and write it down so that all your rights can't be changed with a random 50%+1 poll.
Unless that written constitution were to include an article specifically requiring European membership --which constitutes a great deal more than "figuring out" and "writing down" what the Law is --the existence, or not, of a written constitution is irrelevant. The "poll" was just that: it has no legal significance and as such is no
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*whoosh*!
You did not understand my comment. Your response doesn't address the points I was making. Instead, it is recycled pap that anybody in the UK could have recited 10 years ago. That you repeat it now, when my comment is in regards to a new situation regarding UK laws, just shows you didn't comprehend it.
Re: (Score:2)
Your response doesn't address the points I was making.
So what were "the points" you were making, and what reasonable connection might be drawn between "a random 50%+1 poll" and the lack of a written constitution?
Instead, it is recycled pap that anybody in the UK could have recited 10 years ago
Obviously not. In 2008 none save legally astute clairvoyants might have commented specifically as to the legal significance of the 2016 Brexit vote.
You did not understand my comment.
If that be so, you plainly ne
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Your response doesn't address the points I was making.
So what were "the points" you were making
Stop typing until you get there.
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Stop typing until you get there
Nobody can get beyond what you actually wrote, if you refuse to correct or clarify it.
... BREXIT ... [Y]ou're going to need to finally figure out what is supposed to be in your Constitution and write it down so that all your rights can't be changed with a random 50%+1 poll.
That point, absent any further clarification, must reasonably be taken to be, that a written constitution would have protected against the possibility of Brexit. For the reasons I explained above, you were wrong.
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Actually Google provides better privacy for users. [...] AMP pages are great if you like your privacy.
Thanks for providing the daily doublethink guidance from Minitruth.
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Bows head in ...
No. The name has always been Minitruth.
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Speechless. (Score:2)
I can't believe what I'm reading here.
Ads are dangerous. They often contain malware. Google is by far the best when it comes to checking ads for malware and limiting them to text and a malware scanned link. Also, you can really easily block them. So AMP pages are great if you like your privacy.
Why does Google need to be involved in my http queries at all? It's not altruism.
And from the webmaster's perspective, AMP is a "standard" which only helps Google, NOT ANYONE ELSE.
If "Ads are dangerous", why should anyone trust Pusher No. 1? The company has come a long way from Not-An-Ad-Company.
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You have a choice for your ad-supported content. Ads from random sources that you don't trust and which may contain malware, or ads from Google that are at least safe.
Oh, but you have an ad blocker? Well it's much easier to consistently block Google ads with zero side effects than it is to block every other random ad server in existence.
I'm not saying it's ideal, but given the choice I'll take the safe and easy to block Google ads.
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You have a choice for your ad-supported content
I choose the road less traveled. 'Your' site doesn't get to write cookies by default on my machine. Your 2nd- and 3rd-party content does not load. If your site has little utility at this browsing level, it is a value judgment for me, one which your site will usually lose.
Your initial debate conditions assume that the difficulty in reaching site content is something which I have to endure. We would do well in this industry to treat web content much more like a luxury than a necessity.
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That's fair enough. I do restrict some sites to no third party content and cookies etc, but I find that also breaks a lot of sites that I need. Things like online banking, booking flights, property search and so forth.
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They chuckle much less these days.
online banking
My bank's site works with only "*.{bank}.com" cookies. No 3rd party scripts, and only "{bank}media.com" imagery.
And this is the whole point: we are the customers. We are not the fucking product.
Desktop view (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't know about you guys but 99% of the time on my phone I'm using the desktop version of a page. I hate mobile site design with its tons of empty space and enormous fonts.
Re:Desktop view (Score:5, Insightful)
Gotta agree. Don’t know if the fundamental issue is actually ”mobile” or just “dumb designers”... but mobile sites usually suck.
And “responsive” sites mostly seem to take that bad mobile ethos and force it on everybody, including desktop browsers. In any case, I guess that’s at least equal-opportunity suckitude...
Re: Desktop view (Score:1)
It's mostly dumb designers. It's been many years since web devs gained access to tools to separate content from mark up and they aren't using them properly.
Similarly, the ui is similarly tainted by trying to use the same one on handhelds and larger displays.
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Gotta agree. Don’t know if the fundamental issue is actually ”mobile” or just “dumb designers”... but mobile sites usually suck.
And “responsive” sites mostly seem to take that bad mobile ethos and force it on everybody, including desktop browsers. In any case, I guess that’s at least equal-opportunity suckitude...
I gotta go with dumb designers. I'm a half dumb designer, and I manage to make the sites I run look good on whichever platform you are on.
I suspect these hotshots do not check out their pages except on the computer they design them on. I check my sites out on phone before I publish.
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The "web designers" I've seen are just print page layout designers now doing web design, with little functional knowledge of how a web page operates, and little interest in mobile layouts.
That could explain a lot.
It isn't like layout skills are not needed, but there is a whole lot of html coding that makes it work properly.
I often dislike the mobile version too (Score:3)
I'm used to the layout of the full website, scrolling and zooming is less difficult than finding where the mobile version put something if it had it at all. Similarly, opening a site in a browser whether desktop or mobile version is for the most part easier than using the site's app.
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I hate mobile site design, with its tons of empty space and enormous fonts, with the intensity of a thousand burning suns.
TFTFM.
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Actually, enormous fonts are not that bad for mobile and well, *some* empty space to click links confidently is good... But almost all mobile sites either have just a subset of the functionality, or require you to go through considerable effort to get to some information that was right there on the desktop version.
So, yeah, I also use desktop sites, and for that reason I chose a phone with the largest screen that still fits my hand (a 5.99" thin-bezel XIaomi Mi Mix 2).
As for Google, they have taken over Mic
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Don't know about you guys but 99% of the time on my phone I'm using the desktop version of a page. I hate mobile site design with its tons of empty space and enormous fonts.
I can't stand the web while using my phone either. The weird thing is, the sites I have control over look the same on either phone or tablet or desktop.
And I'm no dummy, but sure as hell not a hotshot. Fully functional web pages.
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i work on an e-commerce website, 40% of our business comes from mobile. We can't ignore that no matter how much i personally hate browsing on the phone.
That's why I design to look good on any platform. But sheesh, going to a website that shows up as a couple words because the font's are screwed up and everything is too damn big is enough to get me to go elsewhere. And in most cases, I'm not going to install an app. The few times I tried that the results weren't much better. And if I'm giving a company personal info to monetize or weaponize, the least they could do is not look like crap while doing it.
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Yeah, I can't even figure out what the "push" is that is intended to be resisted; it seems to me they published some specs, offered some services, and nobody wants to use it. For obvious reasons.
If they want to apply force, I say, "Bring It!" Microsoft tried that, it doesn't end well for them. If they want to go that route, while already having a monopoly, they end up either split into pieces, or siloed into them.
use Firefox (Score:3)
Mobile can be just as bad as desktop if not worse since your typical browser on a phone has little to no adblock abilities
use the Firefox Android app.
it can install all your usual Web Extensions, e.g. uBlock Origin for ad-blocking, Privacy Badger for tracker blocking, etc.
(unlike the Chrome Android app, which doesn't have extensions)
no idea about iOS. but I think I remember all browser apps are forced to rely on the Safari engine, and only provide bookmark sharing, etc.
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Safari on iOS have ad-blocking extensions that can be installed, I'm using one.
For Android I use Firefox with uBlock Origin. The Samsung browser which is very good also have ad blocking extensions and is available for non-samsung Android phones through the Play store.
Target was about ads. (Score:2)
my point however was that by default they do not exist (they aren't installed).
It might be good to refresh the memory:
- the whole Firefox (back when it used to be called Phoenix) was started on the purpose to be a small lightweight browser with only bare bone functionality and all the bells-and-whistles being in extensions (XUL back then, web extensions nowadays), in opposition to the giant Creature Feep that Netscape was becoming.
- Chrome began also with the idea of being light-weight.
Not having too many features out-of-the box is part of the mission in these browser.
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Unfortunately we can look forward to the web serving up only mobile sites, even for the desktop. Actually it started years ago with desktop sites and blogs putting up bigger images, then later came burger menus on desktop, etc. it's just accelerating to all out mobile web now.
Yes, yes, yes (Score:5, Funny)
Betteridge be damned.
GPDR (Score:2, Interesting)
I look forward to the day Google gets record breaking fine for collecting all these personal information without informing or consent from the end users.
Google is free to withdraw from Europe as they had withdrawn from China. Another Europe based search engine will take over, as has happened in China.
Fines and reasons (Score:3, Interesting)
There is also the possible angle of anti-competitive behavior.
This article https://newsdashboard.com/en/how-do-amp-articles-perform-in-the-mobile-serp-for-google-news-oneboxes/ [newsdashboard.com] suggests that non-AMP pages are strongly de-emphasized in search rankings (despite Google claiming otherwise, addition mine).
Now Google was in trouble with the EU before for forcing Android mobile phone producers to pre-install Google Search and browser apps as conditions for licensing its app store.
I don't see yet for what exact rea
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
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Even Google can't fix Slashdot's mobile experience.
Mobile devices vs full-feldge computers (Score:2)
Seems like every year the distinction between the two narrows. Wouldn't that mean that AMP's original purpose is soon obsolete once mobile devices (both CPU and network) are fast enough for the job.
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And then Google has the whole world wide web under its control.
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I don't care how fast my network is. I don't want bandwidth-wasting mobile sites. Not just because I have a limited data cap, but it's still faster to have a lean site regardless.
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theoretically it's the desktop sites that use more bandwidth. they are supposed to be simpler and easier for the device to process and contain less layout directives and fewer superfluous images. Arguable if it is successful in practice, but that is the intent.
Having a site that loads in 50ms versus 20ms won't really matter to a typical end-user. Of course a site that loads in 5 seconds versus 2 seconds will be noticeable. So scale does matter. I predict "desktop" sites will be able to load on our phones in
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Having a site that loads in 50ms versus 20ms won't really matter to a typical end-user
If only load times aimed low. It took 300ms just to load the HTML for this page. Nothing else loaded until then. The Javascript on the page took 1.17 seconds and the last resource didn't finish loading until almost the 4 second mark. The page did start rendering by about 1-2 seconds, so it didn't feel slow. But Slashdot is actually on the nice end of load times compared to especially news sites.
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I remember when a large page took 10-15 seconds to load in Lynx, and it wouldn't display until it the HTML was completely downloaded.
I think like most other things, the software expands as memory, network, and processing power increases. Leaving us with only slightly faster user experience rather than the 1000x faster experience that raw numbers might indicate. (4MB unix workstation running Lynx on a 20 MHz cpu, to a 16GB laptop with four 2 GHz cpus). It seems faster, but not massively so. Much prettier tho
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Cycles of Frameworks (Score:2)
~Marshall McLuhan
The web's search for mechanisms of underwriting is reflected in the screen's "real estate" beginning with AOL's valuations that were sufficient to merge with Time/Warner and navigation was compromised by strategic ad placement informed by users' studies-- the screen was so crowded out, advertisers sought as many inadvertent clicks as purposeful ones. Notions of micro-payments were floate
Fast, easy to navigate. (Score:4, Insightful)
I bet Google crawlers love it when a web page is small, fast to load, and easy to navigate.
But do you know who else likes that? HUMANS like that too!
I get that there are some legitimate issues with AMP, but this sounds a bit like the guy in one of the linked articles is annoyed that Google wants him to stop making shitty websites and he doesn't like it at all because it creates more work for him.
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I bet Google crawlers love it when a web page is small, fast to load, and easy to navigate.
I bet Google doesn't care for regular desktop pages.
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I would love to have Google give lower rankings for desktop sites full of bloated slow loading crap too.
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I get that there are some legitimate issues with AMP, but this sounds a bit like the guy in one of the linked articles is annoyed that Google wants him to stop making shitty websites and he doesn't like it at all because it creates more work for him.
This sounds a bit like a paid Google shill who is annoyed others would dare challenge Google's defacto Monopoly search position and associated bid to take over the Web.
The above statement is a mirror. Don't blame me if you don't like the reflection.
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So by acknowledging it has issues but pointing out that parts of it is actually good for end users, that makes me a shill?
Google's dominance is obviously a huge problem when they abuse it. But the solution is not to keep making shitty bloated websites.
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So by acknowledging it has issues but pointing out that parts of it is actually good for end users, that makes me a shill?
Do you think I'm being unfair to you? That was the point.
It was a demonstration of the problem with mudslinging:
"this sounds a bit like the guy in one of the linked articles is annoyed that Google wants him to stop making shitty websites and he doesn't like it at all because it creates more work for him".
You without citing evidence assert the person is lazy, angry and that he makes "shitty websites" in an attempt to marginalize and discredit him. I simply pulled the same stunt and directed it at yourself.
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I didn't say angry, but I stand by lazy and shitty websites. Obviously a bit exaggerated to make a point.
The evidence are the screenshots he posted about his sites issues according to Google. (bad mobile version of his website)
And the whole article is there because it creates more work for him, and he does not want to do it.(lazy)
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I didn't say angry, but I stand by lazy and shitty websites.
Annoyed is a subset of anger.
The evidence are the screenshots he posted about his sites issues according to Google.
Totality of screenshots provide the following data:
"Reported page navigation issue on your AMP pages
Reported missing non-critical content issue on your AMP pages
Reported social media issue on your AMP pages
Reported media issue on your AMP pages
An evaluation of your site has revealed issues with some of your AMP pages. This issue will not affect your appearance on search, but with just a few changes, you could improve the user experience on these pages. You can see a list of af
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It's not vague. They enumerate 4 features that are present on the main page, but are missing on the mobile version.
His argument is that there is more work to also fix it for mobile. That means he is choosing to create an inferior version because he doesn't want to do the work. That means he is a lazy developer. Which by the way does not mean he is a lazy person
A lazy developer is someone who takes the easy way out instead of doing the right thing.. You can do that while still working your ass off.
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His argument is that there is more work to also fix it for mobile.
You seem to be confusing outcomes with modalities.
Nowhere in TFA is author indicating refusal to support mobile. There is no indication given whether his mobile site needs or does not need to be "fixed for mobile". The argument is entirely AMP vs NOT AMP.
That means he is choosing to create an inferior version because he doesn't want to do the work. That means he is a lazy developer. That means he is a lazy developer. Which by the way does not mean he is a lazy person
A lazy developer is someone who takes the easy way out instead of doing the right thing.. You can do that while still working your ass off.
If the definition of lazy is "someone who takes the easy way out instead of doing the right thing" What is the right thing in this case? Using Google AMP?
To quote TFA:
"AMP is being kept alive artificially. AMP survives not because of its merits as a pro
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My assumption is that doing what google has suggested will improve the mobile web page, but you seem to think that it is perfect the way it is and needs no change. Obviously it is impossible for either of us to know the truth. And we might disagree on this even if we knew what site it is referring to.
There is no indication given whether his mobile site needs or does not need to be "fixed for mobile". The argument is entirely AMP vs NOT AMP.
It seems to me that the things google suggest would improve the mobile experience. That is what I'm talking about.
And for the item about social media, I would suggest removing it on both platforms. That would b
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My assumption is that doing what google has suggested will improve the mobile web page, but you seem to think that it is perfect the way it is and needs no change.
The above assumes things that were never stated. There is no information provided in TFA with which to evaluate any web page. I certainly never stated a positive or negative opinion about his sites.
Obviously it is impossible for either of us to know the truth. And we might disagree on this even if we knew what site it is referring to.
Yet you were able to state the author is lazy, angry and has a shitty site without evidence.
It seems to me that the things google suggest would improve the mobile experience. That is what I'm talking about.
No, the messages are AMP specific and do not necessarily have anything to do with "mobile experience" which can exist independent of AMP.
It is not clear what effect it will have on page rank. The suggestion itself says "This issue will not affect your appearance on search".
Page rank issue raised in TFA has to do with perceived rank disparity of a website
Re:Fast, easy to navigate. (Score:4, Informative)
Sites with "interesting design" NEVER have a focus on content.
When you have a focus on content your site will end up exactly like an AMP page. Fast loading and easy to navigate.
Slow loading bloat is only ever present because of intrusive ads and tracking scripts.
Of-course (Score:2)
Re: Of-course (Score:2, Insightful)
It just makes it easer for Google to shadowban a site
Practice KISS (Score:2)
Web pages are relatively easy to make load fast if you sacrifice certain things and avoid faddish temptations.
Or just quit larding up your pages. (Score:5, Insightful)
AFAICT, most web properties which would even consider using AMP in the first place have never seen a JavaScript tracking framework they didn't like. Oh, LardScript Analytics? Yes, sign me up! I realize that you can't just deliver my 2k of actual content, you need to brand and stuff with headers and footers and links to follow, but do you really need 20MB spread across 350 resources to do it? Get that down to something reasonable like 50k of dynamic stuff and a couple 100k of highly-cacheable stuff, and AMP would be pointless.
https://danluu.com/web-bloat/ [danluu.com]
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When they got back from California and we showed them that 90% of that 2 seconds was analytics+tracking, they were less "amped"...
Yes. Say no to AMP. (Score:5, Interesting)
Google already has enough of a stranglehold over the web.
And don't go with the Facebook Instant Articles or Apple News either.
While AMP is, ostensibly, an open-source project, the fact that it's leadership is in the hands of these corporate advertising giants should give anyone with a lick of sense pause.
Anyone remember WAP? (Score:5, Insightful)
MITM (Score:2)
So a Man In The Middle attack you opt into?
Re: (Score:2)
So a Man In The Middle attack you opt into?
I can haz cheezeburger? In the middle? Man?
Their problem is, they haven't convinced anybody that amp is a cheeseburger, it just sounds like buzzword salad.
Fuck Webmasters (Score:5, Interesting)
Should webmasters "resist Google's push for AMP pages"? Webmasters should really just write mobile websites that don't suck ass, but that's apparently just not something they'll do of their own volition. Most of my mobile browsing is just reading some headlines to kill time, and it's amazing how bad news websites in particular are--laggy scrolling, pop-overs, teleporting ads, teleporting paragraphs, etc. When AMP came out, that shit disappeared from anything I Googled practically overnight--any time I've clicked (tapped, I guess) through to an AMP page, it's loaded quickly, scrolling has worked, and nothing teleports.
Are there privacy implications? Of course, but they're rather marginal for someone already using Google's search engine, e-mail, news reader, chat programs, and browser. Is AMP necessary to write a good mobile website? Of course not, but writing a good mobile website is just not something a paste-eating webmaster will do unless someone grabs him by the ad dollars, forces him into a padded cell, and takes away so much markup he couldn't possibly fuck up what's left.
TL;DR AMP exists because webmasters are universally incompetent. If you chucklefucks weren't utter failures, AMP would never have happened.
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Webmasters should really just write mobile websites that don't suck ass, but that's apparently just not something they'll do of their own volition.
And since Google is doing it for them, they will NEVER learn. I don't see this as a good thing.
If Google has their thumb on the scales, the market will never have the correct information to shutter bad sites.
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If you have non-technical people making those decisions, then you don't have a "webmaster," you have PHB and some code monkeys.
And yes, if you build a site using the best practices from 20 years ago your users will love it! So the question is, is your website something useful, or just some random pap intended as a vehicle to drive ad views? If you don't have real content, then obviously you're not trying to make your users happy, you're trying to exploit them. Sites that have a valid reason for existence of
AMP breaks page rendering (Score:5, Informative)
The last straw for me was when I realized how many pages were breaking BECAUSE Google was silently redirecting to AMP versions of pages. Google forces all users that it thinks are on iOS or Android to their AMP variants even though there are TONs of bugs on iOS that Google is not fixing.
The nonAMP version of the AMP website works better than the AMP version... Check out how AMP breaks scroll-to-top taps on iOS by stuffing everything in extra iframes. Try scrolling around while zoomed in on iOS ... Googleâ(TM)s JavaScript that tries to progressively load content will inevitably screw up and stop you from scrolling far. https://www.google.com/amp/s/w... [google.com]
Natural reaction to a shitty web (Score:2)
While there are problems with AMP, the real problem - which AMP does well to combat - is shitty, bloated, ad-vomiting websites.
Re: (Score:2)
2. Claim the web experience is broken.
3. Insist your proprietary technology which detects & catalogs 100% of the web experience is the solution!
4. Profit!
5. Goto 1...
Why? It's and open standard ... (Score:4, Interesting)
... and, AFAICT, a good and useful one.
Why should I resist that?
So AMP is a reduced HTML standard to make mobile websites load faster and less bloated that the bullshit we see today spewed into the public web by people who can't tell a server from a client and shouldn't be let near a keyboard of a connected computer, let alone in the lead position of some web project. Pagecalls weigh in twice to three times as heavy as an entire Amiga operating system these days. If your would delivered such a thing 18 years ago people would've beat you up and for good reasons too.
So Google wants to cache my website with AMP? Nice. Go right ahead. If they update the content in their cache whenever I do I'm all for it. The more I can tell clients that their crappy bloated piece of shit they call a website is going to be deranked into unseen depths of Google if they don't use sensible unbroken web presentations, AMP is a good thing and it will be a part of my optimisation strategy for professional websites.
If google wants websirtes to load faster... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You seem really, really confused about the technical details.
It isn't a cache. That's just a buzzword they put in to trick idiots. A cache returns the thing cached, so you don't have to look it up again. A proxy that alters the data for each user is not a cache at all. Even if they write the word "cache" in the name.
Nope. (Score:2)
Why? It's and open standard... and, AFAICT, a good and useful one.
Useful for who? The utility it provides is to Google, not the user.
There may come a day when I let Google tell me how I want to utilize HTTP.
But today is not that day.
Objection (Score:2)
I'm not sure this statement is true.
resist everything google related (Score:2)
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If they're not in charge, why would you need to "resist?" Just say no, man. Just say no.
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Google thinks they are in charge. They need to be persuaded they aren't.
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Nonsense. There is a guy on the street corner who thinks he's Jesus. My spiritual freedom does not require me to convince him he's wrong. I can actually just ignore it, because he doesn't have magic powers.
Same here. If they're not in charge, nobody needs to tell them. They can learn about it, or not, who cares?
I remain to be convinced... (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
AMP is basically an attempt to do 'embrace and extend' the open Web with their own replacement 'ecosystem' (which is 'on paper' supposedly open, but in practice it's basically 'their ecosystem'). This is a classic page out the book of the old Microsoft. They're effective trying to replace the Web (with its pesky competitors OS-wise, software-wise, advertising-wise) with 'GoogleWeb'.
Anyone who can't see the serious problems here, lacks imagination.
The more webmasters who join and make their websites AMP-comp
Don't do AMP, but follow AMP rules (Score:5, Insightful)
AMP has two parts. One is a set of very sensible rules for doing good websites. The second is a way for Google to take control of the web.
So what you should do is simple. Make a website that is compatible with AMP. Then remove all Google stuff. You will end up with a website that is independent and fast. And when you are at it, apply the same principles to your destop website.
Directly insert their add stream (Score:2)
I read this as inserting their targeted paid ads. Don't buy from this site, buy from one of our paid ad clients.
Just my 2 cents
...a shark named AOL (Score:3)
On the other hand, everyone who was clued in Internet-wise, hated AOL and everything it stood for. They were frequently and viciously attacked for their monopolistic practices. Is Google in the middle of jumping the shark here?
Why not? (Score:2)
Everyone seems so eager to destroy all the open platforms and give all the power to a few arbitrary proprietary systems dictated by a literal handful of people... what could possibly go wrong?
Re: (Score:2)
CEO of google, CEO of Twitter, CEO of Facebook, CEO of Apple, CEO of Reddit...
Good day, sir.
Re:To have pages that load fast in mobile or other (Score:4, Informative)
6 seconds is not fast. 2-3 seconds for body content or the user bounces. And even that's a long time. If the whole page isn't done loading in six seconds, I'll be suspecting malware or mining JavaScript.
Re: (Score:2)
Firefox will be there when ya'all are ready to stand up.
LOLOL
Firefox was there last time, and it was open source, so at least there will be a fork or something. But the idea that the thing that was called "Firefox" back then still exists is pretty funny. The name was clearly transferred, there is no question about that part.
Re: (Score:2)
The fastest public and most stable DNS server is 8.8.8.8. Try it. You'll like it.
What a load of shit. You should know when you're typing it out, and you feel the desire to tell me how I feel about it, that you're full of shit. You can just stop there and accept that it sucks and you don't know why you're choosing it.
If your DNS is slow enough that you can measure a difference in speed between two DNS servers without blasting them with excess spam, then you have worse problems with your access than that! You should probably be running your own caching DNS server in that case, which shoul