161–170 of 316 posts
The web browser vendors have too much money. They have no incentive to keep the platform small. Google in particular, the cost to implement Blink is essentially meaningless to them, but it is beyond affordability for almost anyone else.
The amount of money that is spent on browsers is such a tiny fraction of web-derived profit it is, in my opinion, surprising that browser vendors don't have more money.
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The concern is not 'now' it's 'later'. Google is a business like any other - and when they have the power to lever a monopolized situation - they will. For example, they may start integrating technologies for which they have exclusive, or at least 'special' access. Can you imagine if all of a sudden Google apps start performing better than anyone else's? Or what if they integrate technology that de-facto collects usa…
"For example, they may start integrating technologies for which they have exclusive, or at least 'special' access. Can you imagine if all of a sudden Google apps start performing better than anyone else's?" This is already happening. I very recently worked on the Edge team, and one of the reasons we decided to end EdgeHTML was because Google kept making changes to its sites that broke other browsers, and we couldn't…
If this case hasn't already been run up to Microsoft's lawyers, start running it up to them. You'll be doing the world a service.
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For example, they may start integrating technologies for which they have exclusive, or at least 'special' access. Can you imagine if all of a sudden Google apps start performing better than anyone else's? They've already started. Google Meet (their version of Hangouts for enterprise) didn't work on non-Chrome browsers for a very long time. If you tried to do a video call with a non-Chrome browser, you were told to in…
> Currently, all of Google's services work on non-Chrome browsers. Google Earth is Chrome-only, because they use the Chrome-only NativeClient. Google Hangouts dropped calling support on non-Chrome browsers for quite a while: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15889018 YouTube (and perhaps GMail) is extra slow on non-Chrome browsers because they use a dropped-and-never-standardised feature that is available only on…
People don't download Chrome because EdgeHTML-Edge sucks; they download Chrome because it's familiar, and ironically doesn't nag the person to enable half a dozen Microsoft's services one by one. There's two greater truths here: that some people are more comfortable using Google's services over those of Microsoft, and that the power of defaults matter, even when they feel skeevy to a part of the population. Google pr…
More accurately, they install it because google.com, Gmail, YouTube, etc. will constantly nag you to install Chrome and will sometimes display errors telling you that a feature requires Chrome even though the browser you’re currently using also supports it.
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As a counter-point, I've had to set up Chrome with ad blockers even for computer illiterate family members and friends because they eventually have it installed anyway. Why? Not because they knew they were installing it, but because every time you visit "google.com" in Edge, you get an intrusive message that says: "Switch to Chrome Hide annoying ads and protect against malware on the web [No Thanks] [Yes]" And that t…
To be honest, I think it's pretty bad that the company with the largest influence on the web is also the company that controls the largest web browser. Chrome should be moved to a different Alphabet company and Google forbidden from promoting it.
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The concern is not 'now' it's 'later'. Google is a business like any other - and when they have the power to lever a monopolized situation - they will. For example, they may start integrating technologies for which they have exclusive, or at least 'special' access. Can you imagine if all of a sudden Google apps start performing better than anyone else's? Or what if they integrate technology that de-facto collects usa…
"For example, they may start integrating technologies for which they have exclusive, or at least 'special' access. Can you imagine if all of a sudden Google apps start performing better than anyone else's?" This is already happening. I very recently worked on the Edge team, and one of the reasons we decided to end EdgeHTML was because Google kept making changes to its sites that broke other browsers, and we couldn't…
Given how easy it is to delete an offending div using the dev tools, it would be easily verified by web developers. There'd be a thousand blog posts and news stories saying "Google deliberately sabotages Edge on YouTube" and the public blowback would be pretty damaging I imagine.
I feel like I’m missing something, because I keep seeing blog posts that tell me a browser monoculture is bad (and the irony of Microsoft saying this is nearly too much), but none of them tell me why. I understand that it was bad in the IE6 days, but IE6 was also closed source and could only be run on Windows (see also the irony of Microsoft discontinuing IE on Mac, not wanting to compete with Safari, a browser made…
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I hope you are right.
Why? Apple has been playing the game of vendor lock-in for quite some time now. How does it make the situation any better? Heck, they have changed - and set a nasty precedent - their hardware for this exact purpose.
That doesn’t mean that things like Lightning connectors don’t also happen but in the context of the web Apple has generally been helpful for fighting monoculture since it used to be a huge threat to their continued existence.
How many billionaires have made their fortunes through the web? Surely some of them care enough about preventing a monoculture to foot the bill for an independent browser development team - if not for profit, for the greater good. Consider it philanthropy.
So Mozilla?
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Why? Apple has been playing the game of vendor lock-in for quite some time now. How does it make the situation any better? Heck, they have changed - and set a nasty precedent - their hardware for this exact purpose.
Large companies usually don’t act with a single voice. The iPhone is what stopped IE’s ability to dictate what the web would work like — not entirely without help but it’s what forced companies to treat support for other browsers as mandatory rather than nice-to-have – and WebKit was a huge win for open source, eventually including Chrome. That doesn’t mean that things like Lightning connectors don’t also happen but…