It's not your site any more. You're just a free content provider to Google now.
Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
11–20 of 261 posts
Re: Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
#12This feels much more like FB's "instant articles" than what I actually want (as a user) from my web pages.
Re: Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
#13Wired broke this story [1] in February 2016, soon after Google announced it'd start directing results to the AMP Cache on the mobile site. In the meta-writeup the next day, Wired wrote "Google's AMP Is Speeding Up the Web By Changing How It Works" [2], while noting that this was a necessary step to compete with Facebook's Instant Articles and Apple's equivalent tech.
[1] https://www.wired.com/2016/02/google-will-now-favor-pages-us...
[2] https://www.wired.com/2016/02/googles-amp-speeding-web-chang...
Re: Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
#14Hm. The x button he mentions is only visible if you got to the page from Google search. If you follow the direct link to the amp page then the header just mentions his original URL as the browser (mobile safari). I would say that such behaviour is quite consistent with mobile so... whatever.
can you imagine if every site that linked to yours had a bar at the top of your page that said "back to facebook" or "back to wikipedia"? mobile web users know how to use the back button but google is taking up your screen real-estate to drive traffic back to google.
this reminds me of sites in the early web that used to link out to sites and frame them with a banner at the top. websites countered this with frame-breaker scripts -- but publishers really shouldn't have to do that.
Re: Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
#15It's not your site any more. You're just a free content provider to Google now.
The author is regretfully realizing that in this day and age when so much of the discoverability of the web is dominated by Google, Facebook, and a handful other players, content is a commodity that these gatekeepers compete over for the privilege of serving as entry-points, and with it, getting analytics and ad network data. But on the plus side, it's a free CDN, if you're passionate about your content.
Re: Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
#16It's not your site any more. You're just a free content provider to Google now.
When I heard about AMP, I didn't get warm fuzzies. I didn't exactly know how or why, but something told me that the main benefactor with this technology was Google, not the user, and certainly not the content provider.
I can make pages faster without AMP by stripping the needless bloat and using a proper CDN. Why do I need this tech again, besides the artificial goad of page rank?
Re: Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
#17Hm. The x button he mentions is only visible if you got to the page from Google search. If you follow the direct link to the amp page then the header just mentions his original URL as the browser (mobile safari). I would say that such behaviour is quite consistent with mobile so... whatever.
can you imagine if every site that linked to yours had a bar at the top of your page that said "back to facebook" or "back to wikipedia"? mobile web users know how to use the back button but google is taking up your screen real-estate to drive traffic back to google. this reminds me of sites in the early web that used to link out to sites and frame them with a banner at the top. websites countered this with frame-bre…
Hugely agree - this feels like a dark pattern callback to one of the early web's uglier constructs.
I mean - running a "we'll host your page for you in exchange for injecting a toolbar" service isn't necessarily an evil thing to do. But there's no reason to opt people into it just because they're tying to perform well on mobile.
Re: Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
#18Well, considering that said traffic originated from Google, and that Google was under no obligation to send it to OP's page, it's a little more nuanced than "stealing". It just means they sent different behaving traffic than usual - traffic that only touches one article and returns to Google. It might discourage webmasters from adopting AMP though, if they have the expectation to lead the visitor to the homepage or o…
Sure Google has no legal obligation to send the traffic to the site, but it is still sort of dishonest. Google convices people to install AMP under the premise that it will help them. Instead, it just allows Google to monetize other people's content, at the expense of the creator. It's hypocrital to bill AMP as an improved mobile experience, while sticking a big button at the top. Also hypocritical to penalize sites…
Well, it does help them -- it promotes their content ahead of those without AMP, and it still allows ads to be served from an approved ad network of the author's choosing [1].
As I wrote before, it's "more of a mutually-consented handholding with small amounts of arm-twisting" [2].
[1] https://www.ampproject.org/docs/reference/components/amp-ad#...
Re: Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
#19Hm. The x button he mentions is only visible if you got to the page from Google search. If you follow the direct link to the amp page then the header just mentions his original URL as the browser (mobile safari). I would say that such behaviour is quite consistent with mobile so... whatever.
can you imagine if every site that linked to yours had a bar at the top of your page that said "back to facebook" or "back to wikipedia"? mobile web users know how to use the back button but google is taking up your screen real-estate to drive traffic back to google. this reminds me of sites in the early web that used to link out to sites and frame them with a banner at the top. websites countered this with frame-bre…
> can you imagine if every site that linked to yours had a bar at the top of your page that said "back to facebook" or "back to wikipedia"?
I saw a site do this yesterday. It was so noticeable because I only permit same-origin JavaScript and the whole site broke (most actually work).
Then I realised there is an intermediary providing this service:
It is the worst of all things.
Re: Google May Be Stealing Mobile Traffic
#20> Consider adding a link at the top of your AMP page, giving user an option to visit the original post
Why should they want to read the post again? The only viable option is to have links to other posts on your site, or maybe a link to the comments.
By the way, what's the purpose of the bar at the top? The back button of the browser already does that, even on mobile.
About analytics: I don't know if those accesses don't show on Google Analytics (I really don't) but what if one uses Piwik? Is there any way to get a report of the access?