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Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

shkspr.mobi

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Re: Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

#81

Post by voltagex_ »

hannob wrote: post #30

AMP is the result of webmasters being unable to provide any kind of reasonable site performance. Which isn't hard. Don't include content from dozens or hundreds of thirdparty hosts. Don't do crazy amounts of super slow javascript. If people would do that there would be no need for AMP. The whole concept is mostly "Google tells people their webpages suck and puts them into a cage where they can guarantee that they don…

How much of AMP's speed is coming from re-hosting content on very very fast CDNs with edge nodes everywhere?

Re: Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

#82

Post by throwbsidbdk »

cdata wrote: post #57

Disclosure: I work at Google. Opinions are my own. I'm surprised when I read discussions about AMP on HN (typically carrying a negative tone regarding AMP) without anyone mentioning an obvious competing concept: Facebook Instant Articles. Here is an excerpt from Facebook's FAQ on instant articles: > Rather than loading an article using a web browser, which takes over 8 seconds on average, Instant Articles load using…

Isn't google drawing it's own line around the open web with AMP? I mean with AMP I'm literally browsing a site hosted at Google with a Google top bar on my page. If a user hits the 'x' on my page it takes them back to google.

AMP is a competitor of instant articles rather than the 'cure'.

If google really cared that much about speed they would just punish slow sites. I see amp as a land grab in cute packaging.

Re: Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

#83

Post by madeofpalk »

robertelder wrote: post #14

I did a technical review of what I felt were the major pros/cons of implementing AMP pages: http://blog.robertelder.org/adding-support-for-amp-pages/ Edit: To save you a click, here are some of the key points: - You can't use Javascript on AMP pages, but you can put Javascript in iframes or substitute the javascript feature for an existing amp-component. - AMP pages require that Javascript is enabled. - In order for…

Have you looked at and 'reviewed' alternatives, such as Facebook Instant Articles or Apple News Format?

Why is passing validation an important thing for AMP? The main complaint I hear about it is the AMP CDN, where Google caches and hosts your page for you. If you're failing validation then they wouldn't do this, right? So you get the advantages of a fast page without the disadvantage of Google reposting your content.

Re: Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

#85

Post by eponeponepon »

StavrosK wrote: post #50
untog wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's worth pointing out, though, that the source of a lot of this performance drain is ads. And Google are the main provider of ads across the internet. To me, AMP feels like a method for Google to sidestep the real issue at hand.

Google doesn't force you to add ads to your site, though. It's disingenuous to suggest that it's the ad provider's fault that you wanted ads on your site.

Nor does the pusher force his marks to start smoking his crack.

Re: Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

#86

Post by threatofrain »

hannob wrote: post #30

AMP is the result of webmasters being unable to provide any kind of reasonable site performance. Which isn't hard. Don't include content from dozens or hundreds of thirdparty hosts. Don't do crazy amounts of super slow javascript. If people would do that there would be no need for AMP. The whole concept is mostly "Google tells people their webpages suck and puts them into a cage where they can guarantee that they don…

I would say that JavaScript can also make aspects of your site faster than pure HTML CSS.

Why? Because most sites are not just a single landing page -- they have links, or tabs, or new pages, and each request could take 0.2 seconds.

So instead of requesting a new page at the time of clicking on a link, and then re-loading your entire page, you just fetch information predictively and mutate the DOM to give a feeling of , faster than even an HTML CSS page behind a CDN.

Re: Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

#87

Post by lucideer »

madeofpalk wrote: post #83
robertelder wrote: post #14

I did a technical review of what I felt were the major pros/cons of implementing AMP pages: http://blog.robertelder.org/adding-support-for-amp-pages/ Edit: To save you a click, here are some of the key points: - You can't use Javascript on AMP pages, but you can put Javascript in iframes or substitute the javascript feature for an existing amp-component. - AMP pages require that Javascript is enabled. - In order for…

Have you looked at and 'reviewed' alternatives, such as Facebook Instant Articles or Apple News Format? Why is passing validation an important thing for AMP? The main complaint I hear about it is the AMP CDN, where Google caches and hosts your page for you. If you're failing validation then they wouldn't do this, right? So you get the advantages of a fast page without the disadvantage of Google reposting your content…

The main advantage of validation is prioritisation in Google's search results, the AMP logo next to your search result on Google (which for most Google users has come to mean "fast"), and the extra speed-up of Google's CDN.

Re: Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

#88

Post by eponeponepon »

f_allwein wrote: post #10
vuanotinv wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the problem with sharing an amp link?

looks ugly, you cannot see where the link goes to on sites that shorten links (e.g. Hacker News), and the link may break eventually, e.g. if Google decides to change/ discontinue the service.

  > the link may break eventually
Or, more likely, Google may break the link eventually.

Re: Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

#89

Post by eponeponepon »

fiatjaf wrote: post #49

This thing breaks the internet hard. What is the meaning of an URL now?

It's one of those long weird words that you see sometimes when you don't Google for GMail like what you ought to.

Honestly, it's only a matter of time before we start getting proprietary locators again. Remember print and TV adverts plastered with AOL Keywords?

Re: Google’s AMP is a gilded cage

#90

Post by cdata »

samat wrote: post #80
cdata wrote: post #57

Disclosure: I work at Google. Opinions are my own. I'm surprised when I read discussions about AMP on HN (typically carrying a negative tone regarding AMP) without anyone mentioning an obvious competing concept: Facebook Instant Articles. Here is an excerpt from Facebook's FAQ on instant articles: > Rather than loading an article using a web browser, which takes over 8 seconds on average, Instant Articles load using…

I work at media company, we have a lot of traffic from both search engines and social media. We have implemented both AMP and Instant articles from day 1 they were introduced. I love Facebook instant articles because it solves the real problem in very efficient manner - no markup on publishers side, semantics only. And it delivers really great user experience - zero loading time for all articles with a "bolt" sign in…

> I hoped Google makes things better, instead all I see is just defensive rhetorics about open web.

My personal opinion is that publishers have a choice: step up and build these types of distribution channels for themselves - to deliver the content in a format they prefer - or else the distribution channels will be built by others and the format of the content will be dictated to publishers by others.

The real danger for everyone is moving away from standard formats that can be rendered easily in a web browser towards something completely proprietary. For my money, AMP is better than Instant Articles in that regard.

> I don't care much about how open or free software is. User experience matters.

I agree that UX is important (if not most important), but I challenge you to consider the long term implications of investing in proprietary solutions just because they make hard problems appear to have been "solved" easily. Free and open source software has compounding benefits over time that proprietary software often fails to provide. Even Apple - a company (in)famous for its proprietary technical solutions - laid most of the foundation for its renaissance with free and open source software, and continues to benefit from (and contribute to) free and open source software development today.

> And I see that Facebook cares about it much more than Google.

Make no mistake: big tech companies care most about money. There is a trap that you can fall into, especially as a technical person, where you believe that a company cares about your success in particular. No company really does. They mostly just care about money. Plan accordingly.

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