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Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

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Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#91

Post by ef4 »

inimino wrote: post #72
cyrusshepard wrote: post #3

This is a good response and I appreciate Malte's effort to engage publishers, but it doesn't calm my nerves about the biggest publisher complaint about AMP: Google owns the chrome (top navigation) on all AMP pages. This makes it easy to navigate back to Google (why would you ever want to leave?) and other publishers in the AMP ecosystem, but much harder to navigate to the publisher that created the page in the first…

If you aren't comfortable with it, just don't use it, right? I'm probably missing something, but I don't understand how something can be such a hard pill to swallow when it is opt-in.

AMP content shows up before other organic search results. So it's not really optional unless you want to lose all your search-driven traffic.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#92

Post by pmontra »

quickben wrote: post #48
FT_intern wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, the user coming from a search engine is most likely to want to navigate back to Google than to stay on the page. It might not be benevolent but it is an improvement to the user experience of most people.

Why? The whole purpose of a search engine is to bring you to the result site, not to search forever.

They read that post and if you're lucky they stop and skim through another one, but that's not the one they came for so it doesn't interests them as much. Same thing when you go to a post through HN. Do you stay on that site or come back to HN?

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#93

Post by mr_luc »

ykm wrote: post #67
chiefalchemist wrote: post #39

Google has their version of the internet. Facebook has their version of the internet. As time slides forward just think of how many users won't know the real internet from these rubber doll versions. Congrats humanity. Your best invention ever and it only 20 years or so to completely fuck it up. This is why we can't have nice things.

Your response sounds more like the religious groups howling "world will end" whenever a new scientific progress is made. Internet survived because of its obvious commercial value. Google and Facebook are doing nothing new but making their ends meet.

Neither of those points are much of a defense. By that same token, one could defend e.g. Microsoft's aggressive misuse of their market dominance in the 90's: 'Windows survived because of its obvious value; MS is just making ends meet.'

It can still be a good or a bad thing for the web as a platform.

Hopefully adoption is slow enough that the default behavior of any "blessed" libraries like this WP plugin can be encouraged to be less ... well, not evil, of course ... but really, why does that toolbar and 'X' need to be there? Browsers have a back button.

My take is simply that this is not a good look for Google, and hopefully they realize that. The article featuring the WP plugin, and these discussions on HN that give a lot of attention to the carousel, and how it competes with non-AMP results, don't build goodwill for the project.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#94

Post by rakoo »

ef4 wrote: post #91
inimino wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you aren't comfortable with it, just don't use it, right? I'm probably missing something, but I don't understand how something can be such a hard pill to swallow when it is opt-in.

AMP content shows up before other organic search results. So it's not really optional unless you want to lose all your search-driven traffic.

The guy said AMP doesn't influence ranking. Who do we have to believe ?

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#95

Post by rakoo »

mintplant wrote: post #24
cyrusshepard wrote: post #3

This is a good response and I appreciate Malte's effort to engage publishers, but it doesn't calm my nerves about the biggest publisher complaint about AMP: Google owns the chrome (top navigation) on all AMP pages. This makes it easy to navigate back to Google (why would you ever want to leave?) and other publishers in the AMP ecosystem, but much harder to navigate to the publisher that created the page in the first…

It's one more step along Google's path to eating the internet. Google-served content discovered through Google search rendered in Google's browser running on Google's operating system on a Google-manufactured device connected through Google's ISP and Google's network protocol (QUIC). Vertical integration.

You know the cool thing about this integration ? Any part can be replaced. Some instantly, some take more time because they involve physical stuff. People use the Google integration because it's there by default, not because they are locked-in.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#96

Post by Semaphor »

rakoo wrote: post #94
ef4 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AMP content shows up before other organic search results. So it's not really optional unless you want to lose all your search-driven traffic.

The guy said AMP doesn't influence ranking. Who do we have to believe ?

It doesn't influence ranking. It shows up at the top in the carousel.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#97

Post by elsewhen »

rakoo wrote: post #94
ef4 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AMP content shows up before other organic search results. So it's not really optional unless you want to lose all your search-driven traffic.

The guy said AMP doesn't influence ranking. Who do we have to believe ?

it may not be a direct ranking signal but i think this is a little disingenuous. by putting this "lighting" icon next to some results, the CTR (click through rate) on the SERPS (search engine results pages), will likely be higher for AMP pages, and that higher CTR _is_ a direct ranking signal which will eventually lead to better rankings.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#98

Post by elsewhen »

rakoo wrote: post #94
ef4 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AMP content shows up before other organic search results. So it's not really optional unless you want to lose all your search-driven traffic.

The guy said AMP doesn't influence ranking. Who do we have to believe ?

that is for organic results, but the AMP news carousel _does_ appear at the top of the search results pages.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#99

Post by adrianratnapala »

kbenson wrote: post #50
quickben wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? The whole purpose of a search engine is to bring you to the result site, not to search forever.

Because not everyone finds a useful page given their query from the first result they check. I often check between 2-4 results for some queries before I find what I want. Also, given that it's hiding during scrolling now (or soon, depending on your platform) and you'll supposedly soon have the ability to define your own AMP menu, I think it mostly should calm the GGP's nerves.

Then this is a half-baked solution to the problems caused by making tabbed browsing hard.

On the desktop, I will open a bunch of tabs and close the ones that don't pan out. Not just after a Google search, but after anything resembling a search.

Mobile browsers allow this (though slightly awkwardly), but most mobile apps which display web content don't allow anything like this.

Re: Response from Google Tech Lead, Re: “Google May Be Stealing Your Mobile Traffic”

#100

Post by sdoering »

visarga wrote: post #66
mintplant wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's one more step along Google's path to eating the internet. Google-served content discovered through Google search rendered in Google's browser running on Google's operating system on a Google-manufactured device connected through Google's ISP and Google's network protocol (QUIC). Vertical integration.

Google is just sending a different type of traffic: "one page traffic", but let's not forget that it is Google that is sending the traffic to AMP pages in the first place, there should be no entitlement on the part of webmasters.

What would Google be able to show it's user if it weren't for this greedy webmasters who poured over their sites to generate content?

What comes first? Hen or egg? Google isn't the internet, the web was there long before Google made things findable. You had to know how and where to look. And yes Google made things back then way better.

Non the less without content on the web a search engine is just blank. Unnecessary imho.

So Google making my content a shared property is something of concern to me. Therefore I am not using AMP.

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