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I decided to disable AMP on my site

alexkras.com

51–60 of 360 posts

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#51
post #8

The author has some very valid points against AMP from a technical standpoint, but for me there is a single reason that is sufficient: the Web is, and should stay, free and open . Indeed, I'm having really hard time trying to understand how people can be fine with AMP while fighting for the net neutrality and so on.

I agree, too. I have the feeling Google is trying to protect the Internet but that this is a heavy-handed approach that actually makes developing on the open web less attractive. I don't see a lot of praise for AMP, and I'm not sure Google will achieve a fast, kind of app-ified Internet as a result.

> I have the feeling Google is trying to protect the Internet

No, they're trying to protect their bottom line. If they wanted to they could easily compute a page weight : content ratio and penalize severely on that alone.

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AMP forces it, GCP is a choice

AMP is a choice. Otherwise, this article wouldn't have been written!

Yes, it is technically a choice. But since Google abuses their search monopoly to coerce people to start using AMP it is not a free choice any more. There is a price to pay for not using AMP and that price has nothing to do with your users.

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#53
I have a visual impairment and one of the things I love about Chrome on Android is the ability to override sites blocking pinch to zoom (i.e. "force enable pinch to zoom").

AMP, also made by Google, seems to somehow get around this browser setting, making AMP sites unreadable and therefore completely useless to me.

Why does Google have these obvious discrepancies between their own products?

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#54
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, too. I have the feeling Google is trying to protect the Internet but that this is a heavy-handed approach that actually makes developing on the open web less attractive. I don't see a lot of praise for AMP, and I'm not sure Google will achieve a fast, kind of app-ified Internet as a result.

> I have the feeling Google is trying to protect the Internet No, they're trying to protect their bottom line. If they wanted to they could easily compute a page weight : content ratio and penalize severely on that alone.

> No, they're trying to protect their bottom line.

Same thing. Maybe your words are better said.

> If they wanted to they could easily compute a page weight : content ratio and penalize severely on that alone.

Agreed.

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#55
Why would anybody enable it to begin with?

There is absolutely no reason for sites such as the one linked here to have AMP enabled. It's a pox on the web and Google has enough power as it is. The sooner AMP dies the better. If you want your site to load faster get rid of the cruft.

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#56
post #22

The author has some very valid points against AMP from a technical standpoint, but for me there is a single reason that is sufficient: the Web is, and should stay, free and open . Indeed, I'm having really hard time trying to understand how people can be fine with AMP while fighting for the net neutrality and so on.

I fail to see what, in AMP, makes the web less free or open. I am usually among the first on the stockade on invasive tech, but I have a hard time to understand the fuss around AMP. Yes, the cache is problematic, as it may allow Google, in a possible future, to filter some content, censor some other or not refresh often some pages. The thing is, if it does that, people will start using Google's caching, that's as sim…

AMP is pretty much mandatory. If you don't do it you're "left behind."

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AMP does not seem like a walled garden tech. any crawler can find and use the AMP version of a page through this tag: " rel="nofollow">https://www.example.com/url/to/amp/document.html"> Thus all google is doing is rewarding sites that have implemented this and as a result load fast, no? imo, its drastically different to Instant Articles because you can never ever find the Instant Articles version of a web page. its p…

Sites that are traditionally called walled gardens (facebook, AOL, compuserve...) often combine four features; (a) all the content is hosted under the walled garden's domain; (b) the walled garden designs key parts of the navigation and layout, understandably acting in their own interests; (c) the walled garden has content policies and declines to host certain content; and (d) users must have accounts and be logged i…

The feature that defines a walled garden is the wall. AMP doesn't have that wall: it is perfectly usable by any other search engine/spider to replicate the experience. The website itself can link to the AMP version if that makes sense for users. Mobile browsers, or web servers, could check for and redirect to the AMP version.

There's a slightly-higher wall for advertisers, I believe. But Google is rightfully afraid of antitrust issues and seems eager to get advertisers besides themselves signed up. But it is a wall in that it requires whitelisting, as far as I remember.

There's a lot to criticise about AMP, but I don't think the "walled garden" metaphor fits.

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#58
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But then you have to suffer the UI of Firefox for Android.

I only use Firefox for Android in my case, I like their UI personally.

I'm left-handed and I can't switch tabs without using a second hand with Fx for Android. The UI also lacks polish in many places and looks really outdated and alien.

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#59
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AMP does not seem like a walled garden tech. any crawler can find and use the AMP version of a page through this tag: " rel="nofollow">https://www.example.com/url/to/amp/document.html"> Thus all google is doing is rewarding sites that have implemented this and as a result load fast, no? imo, its drastically different to Instant Articles because you can never ever find the Instant Articles version of a web page. its p…

> Thus all google is doing is rewarding sites that have implemented this and as a result load fast, no? No. And Google could not care less if pages load fast -- it could incenticize making pages faster with traditional methods instead. It's all about capturing more eyeballs and proxying more traffic.

But why? AMP allows other advertisers. They can track clicks just as easily with a redirect. They could quite easily change the UI of the Android browser to allow for fast switching through search results. Nobody cares what CDN the bytes are served from if the content is identical.

I agree that it's somehow yucky, but I don't see how it can be ascribed to malice intent, instead of an effort to improve the user experience that maybe goes too far.

Re: I decided to disable AMP on my site

#60
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Good news! iOS 11 fixes this. It doesn't fix the "crappy wrapper that wants to do its own scolling instead of complying with the system" issue though.

My thoughts exactly. Remember blogspot hijacking horizontal swipes? Ew!

"Remember"? It's still the case everywhere and it's obnoxious
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