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Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

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Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#241

Post by westurner »

ithrow wrote: post #230
Barrin92 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's venturing into tinfoil hat territory. More likely telemetry told them that some percentage > 50 always toggle the bookmark bar off and they decided to make it the default. It's still there on new tabs after all. Companies like Google are long term greedy, they don't make unpopular UX decisions for scraps.

Companies like Google are long term greedy, they don't make unpopular UX decisions for scraps. Like not letting you add tags? not tagging definitely makes you use google search more.

"Do you like the browser bookmark manager?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24511454 :

> Things I'd add to browser bookmark managers someday:

> - Support for (persisting) bookmarks tags. From the post re: the re-launch of del.icio.us: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23985623

>> "Allow reading and writing bookmark tags" https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1225916

>> Notes re: how [browser bookmarks with URI|str* tags] could be standardized with JSON-LD: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1225916#c116 *

***

WICG/scroll-to-text-fragment "Integration with W3C Web Annotations" https://github.com/WICG/scroll-to-text-fragment/issues/4

***

W3C Web Share API & W3C Web Target API https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30449716

Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#242

Post by wintermutestwin »

fmajid wrote: post #98
lozenge wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vertical screen space was very precious when Chrome came out. I remember their first feature over Firefox was moving tabs into the title bar and removing the menu bar, bookmark bar and bottom status bar, so saving about four bars of space for page contents. Since launch, they've reduced the vertical space of the tab bar/title bar, even as screens gained more pixels. Original design- https://www.google.com/googlebooks…

Vertical space is still at a premium because most laptops use the obnoxious 16:9 aspect ratio. That’s why I keep my tabs on the right in Vivaldi.

As far as I can tell, Firefox, Edge and Vivaldi that are the only browsers with some way to get vertical tabs.

I don't know much about Vivaldi. Can you tell me what its monetization model is? Does it strip the google crap out of chromium?

Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#243

Post by wintermutestwin »

dotancohen wrote: post #228
PetitPrince wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sideberry is a worthy competitor : https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/sidebery/

I might try it next week, but if you'd mention Sideberry's advantages over TST that would be great.

Sideberry lets you turn off the "tree" feature and just have the vertical tabs.

The whole point of vertical tabs is so you have enough characters visible to tell what the tab is. Tab trees waste this precious space.

Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#244

Post by binarynate »

Rovoska wrote: post #44
binarynate wrote: post #20

For quickly loading bookmarks, I made an extension that lets you open or add a bookmark by typing a keyword for it into the address bar: https://github.com/binarynate/omnibookmarks I use it constantly (probably hundreds of times per day) to load common pages I use for running by business and living my life.

This looks useful! Thanks for linking

You're welcome, and thanks for your kind words!

Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#245

Post by [deleted] »

corobo wrote: post #163
hk__2 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And if the user is wanting to visit something like Ford.com, Google can charge Ford millions over time to be the first result, pitting them in a bidding war against Chevy for the top result (with tiny ad disclaimer) for a search for "Ford". That’s not how it works. If you own the website Ford.com, Google won’t charge you millions to bid on the keyword "Ford". They _will_ do it if you are Chevy and are bidding on Fo…

Apparently it is how it works if you go by Basecamp's words https://twitter.com/jasonfried/status/1168986962704982016 I'm making an assumption we're all talking about the ads above the results, as afaik you can't pay to shuffle the real results

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#246

Post by ksaj »

I have so many book marks that are very old, and it is so very rarely that I look for something through them. For the past decade or so I use a markdown page as my "new tab" and that page has links to the places I normally go, and a section for places I go now but probably won't later.

That part is a bit of a temporary bookmark section. And the prior part is where all the important stuff is that I use all the time. Of course I prune it when usage changes. Old stuff goes away. If I need it again, I'll find updated more recent/modern material.

Bookmarks focus on categorization, which fails miserably when you could instead organize by usage. What should be made more easily presentable: 25 years of Common Lisp links, or a section on a single page that links to the Common Lisp resources I'm using right now? How many of the older bookmarks aren't even valid or interesting anymore? Probably most of them.

That's just me, and I'm sure there are people who might agree, and many more who would hate the entire concept and need to tell me why it's wrong.

Bookmarks are basically link hoarding. They quickly become useless.

Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#247

Post by hk__2 »

cma wrote: post #226
redhedgehog12 wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't pay to shuffle the organic results. As for how much you pay for a click on any specific keyword, it isn't fixed and depends on two main things. I am simplifying here. 1. How related (google thinks) your page and ad copy is to the intent behind the keyword. More related = (generally) lower cpc 2. The reserve price that google sets for that keyword. It used to be a second price auction in that you'd only ever…

$0.02 per click is not cheap for your own name, and this protection is more like protection in the mafia sense of the term.

> $0.02 per click is not cheap for your own name, and this protection is more like protection in the mafia sense of the term.

This is something you have to pay only if someone else is bidding on your own brand. Otherwise you’re already the first result and you don’t need any ad. This occurs only if you’re already a big player, and so $0.02 is nothing for you compared to what your competitors are spending. There’s nothing mafia-like here, it would be exactly the same (but much more expensive) in the physical world.

Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#248

Post by fmajid »

wintermutestwin wrote: post #242
fmajid wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vertical space is still at a premium because most laptops use the obnoxious 16:9 aspect ratio. That’s why I keep my tabs on the right in Vivaldi.

As far as I can tell, Firefox, Edge and Vivaldi that are the only browsers with some way to get vertical tabs. I don't know much about Vivaldi. Can you tell me what its monetization model is? Does it strip the google crap out of chromium?

Vivaldi was started by Jon von Tetzchner, the founder of Opera, and is meant to be a power-user’s browser with an emphasis on customizability and keyboard shortcuts, along with a range of unique features.

They do strip Google crud like FLoC, don’t pander to crypto scams and are employee-owned, you can check out their statements on Vivaldi.com. The only valid reason not to consider them would be that they are not open-source.

Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#249

Post by fmajid »

ssivark wrote: post #233
franga2000 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention most websites love to waste vertical space. Navbars keep getting thicker, designers insist on having top bars even when the navigation is in the sidebar and the bottom is eaten up by cookie banners and chat/feedback popups.

I’m guessing the problem there is that mobile is far more unforgiving on horizontal space than laptops are on vertical space, so anybody building a webpage to target both ends up in the regime you’re talking about.

Good point. I suspect websites that start out as a Photoshop mock-up rather than a HTML5 prototype are more susceptible to this.

Re: Ask HN: Why are bookmarks second class citizens in browsers?

#250

Post by marginalia_nu »

lozenge wrote: post #61
adaml_623 wrote: post #23

I thought it was a commonly held thought that Google didn't want Chrome users using bookmarks because it directly competed with their search (and advertising).

Vertical screen space was very precious when Chrome came out. I remember their first feature over Firefox was moving tabs into the title bar and removing the menu bar, bookmark bar and bottom status bar, so saving about four bars of space for page contents. Since launch, they've reduced the vertical space of the tab bar/title bar, even as screens gained more pixels. Original design- https://www.google.com/googlebooks…

> Vertical screen space was very precious when Chrome came out. I remember their first feature over Firefox was moving tabs into the title bar and removing the menu bar, bookmark bar and bottom status bar, so saving about four bars of space for page contents.

Was it really? When Netscape Navigator came out, 640x480 was probably the most common resolution. It used significantly more vertical space than Chrome has ever done. What happened between then and the release of chrome to make vertical space more precious?

Desktop computers have had very abundant screen-space for a long time.

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