51–60 of 222 posts
But I do agree that it's annoying when you go to a site and it's not just a reminder but a full screen ad for their app. I also hate sites that feel the need to load the page, detect you're on an iPad, clear the screen, then load another version that is slower to load and works worse, but has nifty side scrolling.
I posted about that a while back, although not in such a colorful language, and didn't get that much traction, maybe that's why. ;) But I do agree that it's annoying when you go to a site and it's not just a reminder but a full screen ad for their app. I also hate sites that feel the need to load the page, detect you're on an iPad, clear the screen, then load another version that is slower to load and works worse, bu…
Amusing that a rant like this reached #1 spot. Take worst case scenario, darken colors a bit more and then make a generalized conclusion on "web vs. apps". Why do you even look at it as web vs. apps? Are we still fighting radio vs. tv vs. movies vs. theater? If your app is nothing more than webview loading the same content, it is stupid. To see each app as a threat to "open web" even more stupid. To pretend that web…
Because the issue under discussion is proprietary applications with sequestered content, versus standards-compliant browsers accessing a public Web.
> To see each app as a threat to "open web" even more stupid.
Try to fill out your argument. Calling it "stupid" isn't an argument.
If an app sequesters content, and if that content would otherwise be publicly available, then the app has nothing but disadvantages compared to a browser -- for the user, not the company that designed the app.
> To pretend that web tech is always superior ...
Straw Man. Only you have made this argument.
http://www.roanoke.com/digitalsubscription/#replica
• If you're on a computer, you just head to their website, login, and read the newspaper.
• If you're on an Android device, you just head to their website, login, and read the newspaper.
• If you're on an Apple device, you're directed to download the bullshit iOS app.
The reason they give for requiring the bullshit iOS app is that the website requires Flash to do its thing. That makes me wonder if they bothered testing the website on an Android device released after August 2012, when Adobe dropped support for new installs of Flash Player on Android...
It also makes me wonder if they got the memo about the rest of the world moving away from Flash...
It's a strategy to dismantle the Web, which had the "disadvantage" of being simultaneously free and a level playing field, and replacing it with a loose network of fiefdoms, each a walled garden (a term often used to describe Apple in its entirety). Most of these apps are advertising delivery mechanisms masquerading as utilities. Another role they have is to prevent copying of content or links from one fiefdom to ano…
> It's a strategy to dismantle the Web Dismantling the Web isn't anybody's strategy (making money is), but in any case, it's a poor strategy nonetheless. One of the most important things I've learned is that all other things being equal, convenience always wins. A strategy that makes things less convenient for consumers is a losing strategy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proximate_and_ultimate_causatio...
Convenience does always seem to win. I suppose because people are lazy. Or short-sighted. It's hard to put in extra effort now for some saving down the road.
Amusing that a rant like this reached #1 spot. Take worst case scenario, darken colors a bit more and then make a generalized conclusion on "web vs. apps". Why do you even look at it as web vs. apps? Are we still fighting radio vs. tv vs. movies vs. theater? If your app is nothing more than webview loading the same content, it is stupid. To see each app as a threat to "open web" even more stupid. To pretend that web…
I didn't. I said that the overhead of installing an app is unnecessary for the use case of reading the news. I wouldn't install a custom binary on my laptop to read a news website, why should I do so on my phone?
And most apps require permissions that have very little to do with the purpose of the app. Here's what the BBC news reader for Android wants: THIS APPLICATION HAS ACCESS TO THE FOLLOWING: HARDWARE CONTROLS CHANGE YOUR AUDIO SETTINGS Allows the app to modify global audio settings such as volume and which speaker is used for output. NETWORK COMMUNICATION FULL NETWORK ACCESS Allows the app to create network sockets and…
I'm not an expert on Android permissions, but those seem reasonable to me. What permissions do you have a problem with, and what should they replace it with, or do you think is totally unnecessary?
It would seem to me the most practical thing to do is to just dismiss the alert, cluck my tongue at the site's hubris, then read the article within the mobile browser — which more often than not is an option. Where it is not, to actually go down the route of installing the app of an organisation that manifestly has contempt for the end user, then upon discovering it offers up a terrible experience conclude this is fait accompli in the debate of web vs native apps seems like wilful prejudice.
The concluding remarks offer up straw man arguments for why native applications are a bad thing, in spite of the anecdote really just being about companies (which coincidentally makes money from somebody other than the end user) who treat the end user like nothing other the commodity they truly see them as.