Live data from Hacker News

RybbitL Open source Google Analytics replacement

github.com

31–40 of 173 posts

Re: RybbitL Open source Google Analytics replacement

#31
post #9

For me, the best Google analytics replacement has been nothing. Just don’t do analytics at all. Your web site will still work without it. In fact, it will work better!

Once upon a time we did analytics and error analysis by running shell scripts executing awk, sed and grep over a apache or nginx access log or error log. What I am trying to say is that you can still do analytics, even pretty advanced stuff with some more elaborate scripting, if you want. The only thing you need is the access log. Something which has been largely forgotten ever since tools like Urchin became a thing…

> Urchin

Urchin was acquired by Google and was ultimately sunset in favor of Google Analytics. It supported local and hybrid analytics models, the later arguably evolved into Google Analytics.

Re: RybbitL Open source Google Analytics replacement

#33
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just not realistic though. People with marketing departments need analytics. Otherwise, they atrophy and reveal to everyone they are not as necessary as led to believe. People without marketing departments probably never look at the logs like you.

True, but for personal/hobby sites you probably are just better off just not knowing. Nothing good comes of tying your self-worth to how much attention you think you're getting.

There is nothing to suggest that people who want to measure (and perhaps increase) their publishing reach are “tying [their] self-worth to how much attention [they] think [they’re] getting”.

This is sort of like assuming everyone who is taking photos at a tourist attraction is doing so to show off their holiday for social status.

If your site or content is truly valuable, it is a public good to monitor, analyze, and improve upon its reach and usability.

Re: RybbitL Open source Google Analytics replacement

#34
post #20

The market for Google Analytics alternatives is crowded. There's Plausible, Ahrefs web analytics, onedollarstats.com, PostHog, Matomo, Unami, Grafana, Microsoft Clarity (free at any scale), and so many others. Despite minor differences these products all compete for the same users (e.g. if someone is a PostHog customer they probably won't be using Ahref web analytics) yet most of these companies offer generous free t…

Clarity is more of a Hotjar competitor, right?

Re: RybbitL Open source Google Analytics replacement

#36
post #20

The market for Google Analytics alternatives is crowded. There's Plausible, Ahrefs web analytics, onedollarstats.com, PostHog, Matomo, Unami, Grafana, Microsoft Clarity (free at any scale), and so many others. Despite minor differences these products all compete for the same users (e.g. if someone is a PostHog customer they probably won't be using Ahref web analytics) yet most of these companies offer generous free t…

Grafana isn't a Google Analytics alternative. You can build a lot of what you need with it (I've done that), but you still need to manage the actual Analytics part separately, Grafana only gives you the visualization.

It's okay, but I probably wouldn't choose it again. The ease of setting up Dashboards and Panels is great at first, but you pay for it with a low ceiling of what you can do (without building around it) and a "we trust everyone" approach to security.

Re: RybbitL Open source Google Analytics replacement

#37
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just not realistic though. People with marketing departments need analytics. Otherwise, they atrophy and reveal to everyone they are not as necessary as led to believe. People without marketing departments probably never look at the logs like you.

True, but for personal/hobby sites you probably are just better off just not knowing. Nothing good comes of tying your self-worth to how much attention you think you're getting.

I think most people are talking about for business websites

Re: RybbitL Open source Google Analytics replacement

#38
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, but that doesn't mean the concept is bad.

Yes it does. If a user can say "here's my IP address, what data do you have on me?" and you can answer that question, then that's personal data under GDPR. It's pseudynomized, but not anonymized, and pseudynomous data is personal data.

Even if you can't answer that question, if it can be answered, that's still personal data.

Re: RybbitL Open source Google Analytics replacement

#40
post #28
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are these open source and locally hosted? Or you must share your data with a big corporation to use them?

Is sharing your data with a startup or small company any better than sharing it with a big corporation?

Potentially yes, but depends very much on the privacy policy and data handling promises being made.

I think the instinct to distrust big companies is at least partly because many of them have already proven not to be good stewards of data which when combined with their scale has more worrisome implications.

With a smaller/newer player, at least there’s some hope that they’re not capable of the same harms at a smaller scale, and in some cases may market themselves specifically as a more private alternative.

Whether or not this turns out to be true in practice and over the long run is another thing.

Post reply on HN