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Google vs. the Open Web

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Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#171

Post by ajross »

lambic wrote: post #170
ajross wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Characterizing a fairly reasonable position like "we should have a way prevent bots at the client level" as an attack on "The Open Web" is pretty much the definition of a shitpost, no? It's a terrible strawman and it pollutes the discourse. Do you really not agree that people might want the former and not the latter? You genuinely think that the standards folks are being driven by a conspiracy and not what they say t…

1. (noun) any content on the internet whose humor derives from its surreal nature and/or its lack of clear context. Differs from a meme: whereas a meme's humor comes from its repeatability, a shitpost is funny simply because it isn't a predictable repetition of an existing form. Shitposts can become memes, but memes cannot become shitposts. 2. (verb) to create such a post

No idea where you're citing. Oxford gives me "a deliberately provocative or off-topic comment posted on social media, typically in order to upset others or distract from the main conversation", which fits my usage perfectly. You'd agree this framing is "deliberately provcative", no?

Wikipedia explains it similarly: In Internet culture, shitposting or trashposting is the act of using an online forum or social media page to post content that is satirical and of "aggressively, ironically, and trollishly poor quality"; it may be considered an online analog of trash talk.

Even Urban Dictionary is on board: A post of little to no sincere insightful substance. Especially a "shit"(low)-effort/quality-post with the sole purpose to confuse, provoke, entertain or otherwise evoke an unproductive reaction.

Frankly I have to assume you went out of your way (like, off the front page of a Google search even) to find a definition that you could cite just to prolong an online argument. I wonder if there's a word for that.

Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#172

Post by lambic »

ajross wrote: post #171
lambic wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. (noun) any content on the internet whose humor derives from its surreal nature and/or its lack of clear context. Differs from a meme: whereas a meme's humor comes from its repeatability, a shitpost is funny simply because it isn't a predictable repetition of an existing form. Shitposts can become memes, but memes cannot become shitposts. 2. (verb) to create such a post

No idea where you're citing. Oxford gives me "a deliberately provocative or off-topic comment posted on social media, typically in order to upset others or distract from the main conversation", which fits my usage perfectly. You'd agree this framing is "deliberately provcative", no? Wikipedia explains it similarly: In Internet culture, shitposting or trashposting is the act of using an online forum or social media pa…

None of those definitions fit the original blog post. It's not satirical or ironic, it's not aggressive, it's not trolling, it's not off-topic, it's not even a "comment". It's not poor quality (imo). It's an opinion piece.

My definition was from urban dictionary btw, the first entry, maybe it sorts differently for different people.

Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#173

Post by multicast »

jsnell wrote: post #167
multicast wrote: post #149

How can a bot create fake impressions? When a bot (or just a simple program) makes a http request he fetches the raw html code only. AFAIK if you don't actually render the html code in a browser or requesting all the contents afterwards again with http requests (like GET ad.jpg, GET logo.png etc.), no google ad server should be hit. Now you could argue that bots could inflate the popularity of a website and therefore…

It's not about bots creating fake ad impressions by accident. It's people writing bots whose purpose is to fake ad impressions and clicks. They'll then run it on their own website that's running ads, with the goal of being paid by the ad network for this fake traffic.

But isn't this a win situation for Google to a certain extent? Since it uses up the budget of the advertiser much faster. And the accuracy of filtering new revenue coming from ads as a company is already fairly limited in general. But maybe there are multiple reasons that Google really only wants to serve real humans to the ads of its clients.

Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#174

Post by jsnell »

multicast wrote: post #173
jsnell wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not about bots creating fake ad impressions by accident. It's people writing bots whose purpose is to fake ad impressions and clicks. They'll then run it on their own website that's running ads, with the goal of being paid by the ad network for this fake traffic.

But isn't this a win situation for Google to a certain extent? Since it uses up the budget of the advertiser much faster. And the accuracy of filtering new revenue coming from ads as a company is already fairly limited in general. But maybe there are multiple reasons that Google really only wants to serve real humans to the ads of its clients.

It's not a win. The fake clicks will not convert to sales, and the advertisers are seeing a lower ROI on their ads and will go and spend their budget elsewhere in the future. All ad networks will try to filter out as many fraudulent clicks as possible, because they are not optimizing for the maximum revenue today but for the revenue in the long run.

But yes, of course this is not just about filtering out fake clicks. The draft proposal lists a bunch of use cases, most of which have nothing to do with ads.

Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#175

Post by ticviking »

troupo wrote: post #2

The link to Yoav Weiss's blog is great. --- start quote --- So, you don't like a web platform proposal ...you may feel that your insights and experience can be valuable to help steer the platform from making what you're sure is a huge mistake. That's great!! Getting involved in web platform discussions is essential to ensure it's built for and by everyone. ... In cases where controversial browser proposals (or lack o…

The only solution to this kind of thing is to actually roll up our sleeves and make alternatives.

Most people don't have either the skill or time to do that. So we bikeshed instead.

Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#176

Post by PawgerZ »

exceptione wrote: post #81
supriyo-biswas wrote: post #18

I mentioned this in the other WEI thread and I’ll do it here again: Instead of simply flailing our collective arms around complaining about an evil corporation, has anyone written to the respective competition authorities (such as the FTC in the US or CCI in India) about the potential anticompetitive effects of this proposal?

Trying to reach official authorities is a good idea. I will quote and extend part of my call to action I did in an other thread - ban Google all together in your personal life. No chrome and no excuses. Stop the bullshit or leave this profession. Use startpage, duckduck or whatever for searching. - develop with and for firefox and friends only, introduce usability problems for chrome - employ the same tactics as goog…

I'm not well versed on scrapers. How do you fill their storage with /dev/random? Did they employ this tactic on competitors at one point as with the rest of your psot?

Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#177

Post by ajross »

lambic wrote: post #172
ajross wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No idea where you're citing. Oxford gives me "a deliberately provocative or off-topic comment posted on social media, typically in order to upset others or distract from the main conversation", which fits my usage perfectly. You'd agree this framing is "deliberately provcative", no? Wikipedia explains it similarly: In Internet culture, shitposting or trashposting is the act of using an online forum or social media pa…

None of those definitions fit the original blog post. It's not satirical or ironic, it's not aggressive, it's not trolling, it's not off-topic, it's not even a "comment". It's not poor quality (imo). It's an opinion piece. My definition was from urban dictionary btw, the first entry, maybe it sorts differently for different people.

"Google is Attacking The Open Web!" is 100% aggressive. Whether it's trolling or not depends on how people react to it and not its content per se. And here we are in this ridiculous subthread. So, yeah, it was trolling too.

Come on. I repeat: it's a complicated subject and a real problem, and a sincere but potentially flawed proposed solution. It deserves serious discussion and not a bunch of yahoo's throwing bombs about the evil corporate overlord of the week.

Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#178

Post by Izkata »

sakex wrote: post #3

Soon, websites will require kernel access to make sure you don't have cheats installed. (Sarcasm, obviously)

SecuROM is DRM for PC games that installs a rootkit. I first learned about it when it was used with Spore 15 years ago and it bricked my Windows install.

Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#179

Post by multicast »

jsnell wrote: post #174
multicast wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But isn't this a win situation for Google to a certain extent? Since it uses up the budget of the advertiser much faster. And the accuracy of filtering new revenue coming from ads as a company is already fairly limited in general. But maybe there are multiple reasons that Google really only wants to serve real humans to the ads of its clients.

It's not a win. The fake clicks will not convert to sales, and the advertisers are seeing a lower ROI on their ads and will go and spend their budget elsewhere in the future. All ad networks will try to filter out as many fraudulent clicks as possible, because they are not optimizing for the maximum revenue today but for the revenue in the long run. But yes, of course this is not just about filtering out fake clicks.…

Interesting explanation, I totally agree on the click-per-pay part. But how would you track the benefit of ads with paying-per-impression? I know its less expensive, but according to the article paying per view seems to be a quite big part of the ad business.

Re: Google vs. the Open Web

#180

Post by xNeil »

urda wrote: post #91
xNeil wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While that's a very nice saying, and I appreciate you applying in this context, what you're basically saying is we can never ever assess any organization as strong whatsoever, since every organization that breaks up seems strong at some point.

That's not what was said at all in context, and I do not appreciate you putting words in my valid comment. You dismissed the original argument with your own personal truths.

I guess I can see why you feel that way - you intended to say a company that seems strong may be at risk of failing just like any other company (in this case, just because Google seems large does not mean they are not failing) - which is something I (sort of) agree with!

But doesn't it logically follow that the same truth holds for any other 'strong' company, thereby rendering our perception of it (or any other company) worthless? I'm sorry you're disappointed, but I just made a logical continuation, that's all.

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