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I think iOS9 is the strongest evidence of Apple's war on Google. The number of website that I visit that now automatically redirect to an installed mobile app t

by dr1337 11y ago

I think iOS9 is the strongest evidence of Apple's war on Google. The number of website that I visit that now automatically redirect to an installed mobile app took me by surprised. I wasn't even asked for my permission to choose between viewing the content on the browser or in the app! Bit by bit, iOS and Apple is eroding away the free and open nature of the web. Almost every app that I have seen on the AppStore are merely consumers and senders of JSON to a REST API that could have easily been implemented as a HTML5 web app.

JimDabell 11y ago
This exemplifies a misunderstanding I see a lot of people make. The web isn't whatever happens to be rendered by a browser. It's a shared information space full of linked resources. The protocol and document format aren't defining characteristics of the web, they are implementation details. It's the links and distributed nature that are the defining qualities of the web. If you followed a link to some content, then it's on the web – even if the native application that is rendering it isn't called a general-purpose web browser, and even if a general-purpose web browser can't render that content. There is no dichotomy between native applications and the web. HTML document in a web browser -> Link -> JSON document in a native app -> Link -> HTML document ina web browser is one unbroken chain of surfing the web. Deep links in iOS 9 just make this a more seamless experience than before, and they do it in a way that is more compatible with non-native applications. Before, you had to mess about with application-specific schemes. Now you can do it with standard HTTP URIs that can be useful to non-iOS devices as well. If you prefer an HTML document rendered in Mobile Safari to a JSON document rendered in a different iOS application, then you can argue that, but you aren't arguing for the web over the non-web – you're arguing for a single generic document viewer over specialised ones. In both cases, you are using a native iOS application to view a remote document that you followed a link to.
- magicalist 11y ago
  This just redefines the web to include, for instance, all excel documents because they can be linked to on a web page and my OS will automatically open them in excel. Which means the web is really all digitized information and can never be harmed because it's just a Deep Link away. That's fine, but not a particularly useful definition (you could just refer to "all data formats that have a program that can display them") and it completely misses the worries of the GP around "the free and open nature of the web".
  - JimDabell 11y ago
    > This just redefines the web I'm not redefining anything, I'm correcting a (very common) misconception. This is how Tim Berners-Lee defines the Web, and how it's described by the W3C. I know this is not how you are used to thinking about the web, but that is how it is defined by its creator and its governing standards body. > all excel documents because they can be linked to on a web page If you put an Excel document on a website, is it not on the Web? > Which means the web is really all digitized information and can never be harmed because it's just a Deep Link away. You're putting words in my mouth – I didn't say that. > That's fine, but not a particularly useful definition It is; this definition isn't nearly as all-encompassing as you appear to assume. It excludes many types of native application, and it also excludes lots of things that are commonly referred to as web content. For instance, content that you can find by clicking through an SPA but is not otherwise addressable shouldn't really be thought of as on the web, even if you can find a way to make it appear in a browser. If it's not addressable, it's not on the web. > it completely misses the worries of the GP around "the free and open nature of the web". I'm not missing them, I'm clarifying the context. This really isn't about whether it's on the web or not and arguments going down that path are missing the point.
- r00fus 11y ago
  Here's where I would distinguish the Internet and the "web". I think the web is browser-based almost by definition. However, I see the Internet as a superset of the web. The internet includes VOIP, video streaming and apps. A large part of it is not consumable via HTTP through a browser. Just because it runs on port 80/443 doesn't mean it's the web. I'd say you need to be able to consume it on a browser to be part of the web.
  - JimDabell 11y ago
    > I'd say you need to be able to consume it on a browser to be part of the web. Once upon a time, JPEG images didn't open inline in a web browser. When you linked to a JPEG document, it would open in another application. They were resources that you could link to on websites, but browsers couldn't render them directly. Were those JPEGs on websites not really on the Web? Did the first browser to implement an inline JPEG renderer suddenly add all JPEGs with URIs onto the Web? Browsers don't define what's on the Web. What's on the Web is defined by links.
- veidr 11y ago
  You are right in what you say, as far as it goes, but I think you are overlooking the other fundamental piece of "the web" -- the existence (or at least the potential existence) of multiple, competing client implementations. This is as important as all that other stuff. If only one proprietary implementation/app can access a set of links, it doesn't matter that they are standard HTTP URIs that serve standard JSON or whatever. They might as well be links to CompuServe or eWorld resources, at that point. That isn't always the case, but it is sometimes the case (and is sometimes enforced with some kind of token or other mechanism to prevent access by "unauthorized" client apps). I would argue that those cases are fundamentally different from "the web".
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
jasonmcalacanis 11y ago
You get it.... step by step Apple is taking Google out of the picture.

by dr1337 11y ago

JimDabell 11y ago

This exemplifies a misunderstanding I see a lot of people make. The web isn't whatever happens to be rendered by a browser. It's a shared information space full of linked resources. The protocol and document format aren't defining characteristics of the web, they are implementation details. It's the links and distributed nature that are the defining qualities of the web. If you followed a link to some content, then it's on the web – even if the native application that is rendering it isn't called a general-purpose web browser, and even if a general-purpose web browser can't render that content. There is no dichotomy between native applications and the web. HTML document in a web browser -> Link -> JSON document in a native app -> Link -> HTML document ina web browser is one unbroken chain of surfing the web. Deep links in iOS 9 just make this a more seamless experience than before, and they do it in a way that is more compatible with non-native applications. Before, you had to mess about with application-specific schemes. Now you can do it with standard HTTP URIs that can be useful to non-iOS devices as well. If you prefer an HTML document rendered in Mobile Safari to a JSON document rendered in a different iOS application, then you can argue that, but you aren't arguing for the web over the non-web – you're arguing for a single generic document viewer over specialised ones. In both cases, you are using a native iOS application to view a remote document that you followed a link to.

magicalist 11y ago
This just redefines the web to include, for instance, all excel documents because they can be linked to on a web page and my OS will automatically open them in excel. Which means the web is really all digitized information and can never be harmed because it's just a Deep Link away. That's fine, but not a particularly useful definition (you could just refer to "all data formats that have a program that can display them") and it completely misses the worries of the GP around "the free and open nature of the web".
- JimDabell 11y ago
  > This just redefines the web I'm not redefining anything, I'm correcting a (very common) misconception. This is how Tim Berners-Lee defines the Web, and how it's described by the W3C. I know this is not how you are used to thinking about the web, but that is how it is defined by its creator and its governing standards body. > all excel documents because they can be linked to on a web page If you put an Excel document on a website, is it not on the Web? > Which means the web is really all digitized information and can never be harmed because it's just a Deep Link away. You're putting words in my mouth – I didn't say that. > That's fine, but not a particularly useful definition It is; this definition isn't nearly as all-encompassing as you appear to assume. It excludes many types of native application, and it also excludes lots of things that are commonly referred to as web content. For instance, content that you can find by clicking through an SPA but is not otherwise addressable shouldn't really be thought of as on the web, even if you can find a way to make it appear in a browser. If it's not addressable, it's not on the web. > it completely misses the worries of the GP around "the free and open nature of the web". I'm not missing them, I'm clarifying the context. This really isn't about whether it's on the web or not and arguments going down that path are missing the point.
r00fus 11y ago
Here's where I would distinguish the Internet and the "web". I think the web is browser-based almost by definition. However, I see the Internet as a superset of the web. The internet includes VOIP, video streaming and apps. A large part of it is not consumable via HTTP through a browser. Just because it runs on port 80/443 doesn't mean it's the web. I'd say you need to be able to consume it on a browser to be part of the web.
- JimDabell 11y ago
  > I'd say you need to be able to consume it on a browser to be part of the web. Once upon a time, JPEG images didn't open inline in a web browser. When you linked to a JPEG document, it would open in another application. They were resources that you could link to on websites, but browsers couldn't render them directly. Were those JPEGs on websites not really on the Web? Did the first browser to implement an inline JPEG renderer suddenly add all JPEGs with URIs onto the Web? Browsers don't define what's on the Web. What's on the Web is defined by links.
veidr 11y ago
You are right in what you say, as far as it goes, but I think you are overlooking the other fundamental piece of "the web" -- the existence (or at least the potential existence) of multiple, competing client implementations. This is as important as all that other stuff. If only one proprietary implementation/app can access a set of links, it doesn't matter that they are standard HTTP URIs that serve standard JSON or whatever. They might as well be links to CompuServe or eWorld resources, at that point. That isn't always the case, but it is sometimes the case (and is sometimes enforced with some kind of token or other mechanism to prevent access by "unauthorized" client apps). I would argue that those cases are fundamentally different from "the web".

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

jasonmcalacanis 11y ago

You get it.... step by step Apple is taking Google out of the picture.