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Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

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Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#151

Post by kuschku »

cramforce wrote: post #44
jasonhansel wrote: post #40

I don't see why Google needs to have its own cache for AMP pages. If a publisher has its own fast CDN, why not just let it serve the AMP pages from its own domain?

The pre-rendering is one feature that requires a trust relationship between the host (to only serve valid AMP) and the platform. Otherwise the page may e.g. use a lot of CPU while in the background.

So you’re saying AMP doesn’t actually speed up pages at all, and it’s only sped up because you pre-render?

You just admitted the purpose of AMP being moot.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#152

Post by kuschku »

cramforce wrote: post #36
TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #18

Does Google have any plans to let users opt out? Maybe an icon that takes you to the original? I tried opening the AMP link in a new tab and it took me to the site, so at least there's a workaround. Since I normally use Firefox Mobile (has to try it with Chrome), I don't get the AMP icon and I'm taken to the requested site. I'm guessing this functionality is limited to Chrome and (maybe?) Safari on mobile. AMP is att…

AMP works great in Firefox (modulo this bug right now https://github.com/ampproject/amphtml/issues/5479 :) and all other modernish browsers. Google Search currently chooses not to display it for FX, but that is not due to a limitation in AMP.

Instead, it’s because Google Search artificially penalizes Firefox users, and even removes search options for them.

There’s been discussion about adding Google Search to the list of sites for which Firefox Mobile always serves a faked User Agent because of this hostile and anticompetitive behaviour before.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#153

Post by jarman »

chiefalchemist wrote: post #39

Google has their version of the internet. Facebook has their version of the internet. As time slides forward just think of how many users won't know the real internet from these rubber doll versions. Congrats humanity. Your best invention ever and it only 20 years or so to completely fuck it up. This is why we can't have nice things.

>many users won't know the real internet

Many users have no need for 'real internet'.

>completely fuck it up

No. 'Real internet' is still there, it's not getting absolutely smaller, only relatively to 'rubber doll' one

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#154

Post by goda90 »

rakoo wrote: post #95
mintplant wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's one more step along Google's path to eating the internet. Google-served content discovered through Google search rendered in Google's browser running on Google's operating system on a Google-manufactured device connected through Google's ISP and Google's network protocol (QUIC). Vertical integration.

You know the cool thing about this integration ? Any part can be replaced. Some instantly, some take more time because they involve physical stuff. People use the Google integration because it's there by default, not because they are locked-in.

There's a part that already can't be replaced while keeping all the others. Google Fi only works with Nexus devices. It could be a lack of OEM interest, but who knows what Google does that might keep it that way.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#155

Post by ComodoHacker »

jrockway wrote: post #143
ComodoHacker wrote: post #109

>Hey, this is Malte and I am the tech lead of the AMP Project for Google. Of all his 725-words response only 18 words directly address the problem: >We’re looking at ways to make the source link more discoverable and will update once that is done. That's 2.5%. Is he really a tech lead?

This seems to compare favorably with the original article. How much information density are you expecting? Then you go on to imply that he's unqualified to be a TL because you don't like his polite and conversational tone in an article that criticized his project? I just don't understand HN anymore.

>I didn't imply anything you've said. I just noticed that his response looks like a product of PR or marketing department rather then tech lead.

A appreciate the fact of quick reply, even if half of the credit for it should go to HN discussion.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#156

Post by [deleted] »

visarga wrote: post #82
chiefalchemist wrote: post #39

Google has their version of the internet. Facebook has their version of the internet. As time slides forward just think of how many users won't know the real internet from these rubber doll versions. Congrats humanity. Your best invention ever and it only 20 years or so to completely fuck it up. This is why we can't have nice things.

People need to own the means of production. In this case, it's the search engine and social network. We can't rely on companies, because they are greedy, nor on government, because it is corrupt. This is what happens when we don't own the tools we use - we are subject to exploitation, others making fortunes on our backs and abusing us by incessant tracking. I'm amazed that there is no federated (not owned by a single…

[deleted]

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#157

Post by maxxxxx »

jdironman wrote: post #126
pyrale wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You know the cool thing about this integration ? Any part can be replaced. How do you replace search ? How do you get competitive against mail, youtube without the amount of data google uses to sell ad on them ?

All I hear is a challenge. I'm not a big data engineer, but I would be interested in seeing others take it as a challenge to develop a unique, effective, and open platform that rivals the Google monopoly.

The problem is that Google is also very good in lots of areas. This makes the challenge even more difficult.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#158

Post by Sindisil »

antocv wrote: post #134
the_duke wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With search, we already approaching that point. No other search engine comes close to the quality of Google, at least for certain topics. Outside of Russia, China, Japan and some other countries Google is the dominant search with a big lead. And that is troubling indeed! Competition is good. And necessary for a healthy market. It also means that Google has a huge amount of control over what information can be discove…

Bing is still using Google as its backend. www.yandex.com is a really good alternative, I found it even offers better search results for most topic I look at.

Bing doesn't use Google as its back end ... I don't believe it ever did.

Yahoo did switch to using Bing as its back end, some years ago.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#159

Post by skykooler »

Jaruzel wrote: post #105
nostromo wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why we have back buttons, no?

Most (if not all) default browsers on mobile, auto scroll/hide the navigation bar off the display after a few seconds. For most non-techie users this means it's 'gone'. Ergo, they have no back button anymore. I've watched many people just open/shut/open/shut their mobile browser just to get back to previous pages - in many cases even re-searching the same query over and over again. This is modus operandi for many use…

Isn't Google in charge of Android? Seems like they could fix the button-hiding there instead of adding an HTML workaround for every AMQP website.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#160

Post by woliveirajr »

the_duke wrote: post #124
lucaspiller wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the moment yes you are right, but if we want it to stay that way we need to do something about it now. I agree that people mainly use Google because it's the default, but if we aren't careful there won't be an alternative left that can stand up against them. The only hope we'll have then is that Facebook, Apple, Amazon or Microsoft decide to tackle Google head on, but in most cases where that has happened in the p…

With search, we already approaching that point. No other search engine comes close to the quality of Google, at least for certain topics. Outside of Russia, China, Japan and some other countries Google is the dominant search with a big lead. And that is troubling indeed! Competition is good. And necessary for a healthy market. It also means that Google has a huge amount of control over what information can be discove…

And that's the point: quality. Altavista was a good search engine at it's time and now it's just memories. Because a "better" search engine appeared, giving results that were more useful.
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