4 ms·

It's a lot less open than html; and the development is clearly steered by platform companies, and thus is unsurprisingly biased in their favor, over that of lot

by emn13 9y ago

It's a lot less open than html; and the development is clearly steered by platform companies, and thus is unsurprisingly biased in their favor, over that of lots of other stakeholders. I don't think AMP would have a snowflakes chance in hell to succeed on it's own merits. It's success now is due to SERP-based strongarming by Google. Given how simple it is load quickly, I think its inexplicable that AMP is so complex and its development so closed.

notatoad 9y ago
What exactly is the benefit that these platform companies derive from AMP? Last time i asked the claim was that google gets some "tracking" benefit by serving the amp.js file the pages have to include, which seems unlikely but whatever. But for Twitter, or Bing, or any other platform that is preferring to link to AMP pages over full-featured HTML, what is the benefit? It can't be tracking for them, they aren't hosting the amp.js file. The only possible benefit I can see for Twitter to link to AMP is that their testing proves users prefer AMP pages, meaning a better user experience is result when "development is clearly steered by platform companies". When you say AMP is biased in the platform companies favour, what you really mean is it is biased in the user's favour. As we've seen with the state of the non-amp mobile web, it's not simple to load quickly. Maybe it's simple to implement if that is your goal, but convincing all the involved stakeholders that it's a worthwhile goal is hard, and so the mobile web is slow as hell. The open web had their chance to make fast sites, and failed. So now an industry-led carrot-and-stick style approach is being used, and it's actually working. pages load fast now. And the HN Community, who is responsible for making a lot of those slow sites ("oh! let's load another three analytics platforms, it's only a couple megs") is angry.
- gregable 9y ago
  Note also that due to browser caching, Google wouldn't even get some sort of "tracking benefit" if they wanted to. Most of these documents do not trigger an actual browser request for these javascript files. Also, if the webmaster wants, they can simply add `rel=noreferrer` to the script tags. This is still considered valid by the AMP Validator.
- akras14 9y ago
  Benefit for Google, locking people (making it easy to return) into their "platform" thanks to AMP bar and carousel and control over AMP and by extensions large portion of the web. Twitter, I can't see benefits, other than what you mention i.e. tests show users preferring it. My premise is that there is a large enough group of people who would prefer to opt out. I have no idea how large or small this group is.
- emn13 9y ago
  One way this is beneficial is that it allows them to steer e.g. the evolution of stuff like https://www.ampproject.org/learn/who-uses-amp/amp-ads/ https://www.ampproject.org/learn/who-uses-amp/amp-ads/ Some ways of implementing fast (mobile) loading have the potential to be quite disruptive to Google's business model; AMP is a way to ensure that doesn't happen. Note that AMP is open-ish now, not when it was initially developed. The general model is thus a fait-accompli. AMP is harmless enough nobody is likely to get all to worked up about it (despite these comments, neither am I!), but it does fit the mold of classic monopoly abuse rather neatly: using dominance in one sector to influence others in your favor.

by emn13 9y ago

notatoad 9y ago

What exactly is the benefit that these platform companies derive from AMP? Last time i asked the claim was that google gets some "tracking" benefit by serving the amp.js file the pages have to include, which seems unlikely but whatever. But for Twitter, or Bing, or any other platform that is preferring to link to AMP pages over full-featured HTML, what is the benefit? It can't be tracking for them, they aren't hosting the amp.js file. The only possible benefit I can see for Twitter to link to AMP is that their testing proves users prefer AMP pages, meaning a better user experience is result when "development is clearly steered by platform companies". When you say AMP is biased in the platform companies favour, what you really mean is it is biased in the user's favour. As we've seen with the state of the non-amp mobile web, it's not simple to load quickly. Maybe it's simple to implement if that is your goal, but convincing all the involved stakeholders that it's a worthwhile goal is hard, and so the mobile web is slow as hell. The open web had their chance to make fast sites, and failed. So now an industry-led carrot-and-stick style approach is being used, and it's actually working. pages load fast now. And the HN Community, who is responsible for making a lot of those slow sites ("oh! let's load another three analytics platforms, it's only a couple megs") is angry.

gregable 9y ago
Note also that due to browser caching, Google wouldn't even get some sort of "tracking benefit" if they wanted to. Most of these documents do not trigger an actual browser request for these javascript files. Also, if the webmaster wants, they can simply add `rel=noreferrer` to the script tags. This is still considered valid by the AMP Validator.
akras14 9y ago
Benefit for Google, locking people (making it easy to return) into their "platform" thanks to AMP bar and carousel and control over AMP and by extensions large portion of the web. Twitter, I can't see benefits, other than what you mention i.e. tests show users preferring it. My premise is that there is a large enough group of people who would prefer to opt out. I have no idea how large or small this group is.
emn13 9y ago
One way this is beneficial is that it allows them to steer e.g. the evolution of stuff like https://www.ampproject.org/learn/who-uses-amp/amp-ads/ https://www.ampproject.org/learn/who-uses-amp/amp-ads/ Some ways of implementing fast (mobile) loading have the potential to be quite disruptive to Google's business model; AMP is a way to ensure that doesn't happen. Note that AMP is open-ish now, not when it was initially developed. The general model is thus a fait-accompli. AMP is harmless enough nobody is likely to get all to worked up about it (despite these comments, neither am I!), but it does fit the mold of classic monopoly abuse rather neatly: using dominance in one sector to influence others in your favor.