8 ms·

This is why I don't like the web in it's current form. It's not anymore about freely sharing information. It is about creating uncopyable 'experiences' and prog

by madez 9y ago

This is why I don't like the web in it's current form. It's not anymore about freely sharing information. It is about creating uncopyable 'experiences' and programs in the web. I don't want services I may or may not use. That is not the web I want. Maybe if browsers didn't include JavaScript, the situation would improve. But even the supposedly user-friendly Mozilla is backing JavaScript.

tzahola 9y ago
This is the future you chose :^) https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/07/amid-unprecedented-controversy-w3c-greenlights-drm-web https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/07/amid-unprecedented-con...
icebraining 9y ago
Mozilla was co-founded by the creator of JavaScript. Chances are they don't share your opinion regarding it.
Blaiz0r 9y ago
I'm glad you and the above poster have said this, I also feel very strongly that the web has been completely trapped by coorporate interests. I feel like the web as we know it should be abandoned to coorporations and people that want an open platform for knowledge sharing should start something new that has to stay open.
- rusk 9y ago
  This is the nub of the net neutrality argument for me. We don't need to "start something different" we just need to ensure that what's there can still be used for both corporations, and the public at large.
- eloisant 9y ago
  The web is fine, the "closed garden" experiences are in native apps ecosystems.
- krapp 9y ago
  >I also feel very strongly that the web has been completely trapped by coorporate interests. "corporate interests" haven't trapped the web. People are choosing to pretend that the web has somehow ceased to exist outside of a few silos, or that javascript has no purpose other than to further corporate or media interests, or that Facebook owns HTML now, but none of that is true. The web is just as open as it's ever been. Just because mainstream viewing habits tend to converge towards a few corporate owned social media sites does not mean the web has become owned by corporations, it just means people have gotten lazy and don't want to work to discover new content.
  - CaptSpify 9y ago
    This is a joke, right? We are building drm into the browsers themselves now. We are letting companies tell people that "there is no way to access media, unless you go through our walled garden" and defending the company! The open web is farther gone than it's ever been.
    - krapp 9y ago
      I shouldn't have to point this out to someone on Hacker News but browsers are not the web. Facebook is not the web. Twitter is not the web. Not even Google is the web. No one is putting a gun to anyone's head and forcing them to use EME when they distribute media, and it certainly will no more be the case that all media will be forced through DRM and a walled garden than it ever was. The companies that will use this are the companies that would have used DRM anyway, just in another form. The web, as a whole, is unaffected.
      - CaptSpify 9y ago
        Wow, I've heard some bad arguments on here, but this one is great. Good work.
        deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
- Flow 9y ago
  We need something like BittorrentYouTube. Something that is somewhat indexed, content can be directly linked to, and there's no-one to control what can be there and what can not. Of course it will be a bit slower at startup times, but it's still faster than a video that has been removed in your country or removed due other arbitrary reasons.
- Mindwipe 9y ago
  There's nothing to stop you doing all the open platform knowledge sharing on the current web apart from lack of market share of the audience. How moving to a new, less popular distribution mechanism would make that any better is not clear to me.
- narrator 9y ago
  The only people who are actually serious about creating alternatives to major social media networks are alt-right (for lack of a better word) who have been banned from these services. Of all these alternatives, I think bitchute.com is really innovative in that it has a Bittorrent video viewer that solves the bandwidth usage problem by going p2p. Not a lot of stuff on there yet. For now, that site is mostly full of political content that would get banned, or at least demonitized, on YouTube. I have a hard time getting over the irony that the alt-right are going to be the ones to save the open Internet while the rest of Silicon Valley sits around and does nothing because they need to be protected by the machines of loving grace [1] that are the vast content moderation and filtering apparatus of the major social networks. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Watched_Over_by_Machines_of_Loving_Grace https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Watched_Over_by_Machines...
  - icebraining 9y ago
    Bitchute.com is just another centralized system, that happens to offload some of their costs onto their users. Using webtorrent is cute, but no conceptually no different than what early Spotify did. They still control what you're allowed to see.
Angostura 9y ago
I feel differently. For the most part, I still the Web is about freely sharing information - most of the stuff from the good old days of 1998 is still there. However, in addition various companies who otherwise wouldn't put their content on the Web, have to decided to do so, but on the proviso that technology exists that gives them adequate control over how it is distributed. I don't think that's a particularly bad thing.
finchisko 9y ago
Actually that is why you should like web in current form. Google blocked native youtube app, but kept youtube web accessible from amazon devices. IMO there should not be be proprietary app to access youtube or any other service, if the same experience could be delivered for everybody via web. If I owned the Youtube, I'll block Amazon too. They're practically taking advantage and not want to give anything back. Don't want to sell google appliances, don't want to participate in youtube ad program. Only word that came to mind is to describe such a attitude is leech.
- anon1385 9y ago
  >Actually that is why you should like web in current form. Google blocked native youtube app, but kept youtube web accessible from amazon devices From the article: > Amazon has responded, and its response points to the unfair nature of Google effectively blocking access to the YouTube web site based on the type of device being used to access it. "Echo Show and Fire TV now display a standard web view of YouTube.com and point customers directly to YouTube's existing website," Amazon's statement reads. "Google is setting a disappointing precedent by selectively blocking customer access to an open website. We hope to resolve this with Google as soon as possible."
  - finchisko 9y ago
    If you think about it, those statements doesn't make sense. 1. Google effectively blocking access to the YouTube web site based on the type of device being used to access it. 2. Show and Fire TV now display a standard web view of YouTube.com and point customers directly to YouTube's existing website I understood it, that Google blocked Amazon to access youtube via native app. And Amazon reaction was to switch their youtube app to webview, which basically renders web version of youtube.
- syshum 9y ago
  >Google blocked native youtube app, but kept youtube web accessible from amazon devices. This is false, the app on the fire tv is simply a webview of https://www.youtube.com/tv https://www.youtube.com/tv that is publicly accessible They are not doing any, no my knowledge, more than wrapping that page up in a webview
astura 9y ago
This doesn't make sense, I really don't understand this at all. JavaScript makes the web powerful so more content can be distributed via the Web. Without JavaScript we'd be having much more native apps, not less. The web runs on any platform with a web browser (for the most part), native apps only run from one platform. Crippling the Web leads to more silos.
- CaptSpify 9y ago
  Javascript takes control from the client and gives it to the server. This is a terrible idea, that has ruined the web. Are there good sides to JS? sure, but they, by far, don't outweigh the bad.
  - astura 9y ago
    Nonsense, javascript runs on the client. No javascript = 100% code runs on the server.
    - CaptSpify 9y ago
      Uh yeah, that's my point. Running code from some random server on your machine without verifying it first is a terrible idea. We really need to start seeing the internet as a dark and scary place again. There's too much blind trust nowadays.
      - krapp 9y ago
        How much of the code running on your operating system have you verified before compiling it?
        deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
        CaptSpify 9y ago
        A bit. But that's not the point. The point is I can verify it. There's a mountain of difference between the two.

by madez 9y ago

tzahola 9y ago

This is the future you chose :^) https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/07/amid-unprecedented-controversy-w3c-greenlights-drm-web https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/07/amid-unprecedented-con...

icebraining 9y ago

Mozilla was co-founded by the creator of JavaScript. Chances are they don't share your opinion regarding it.

Blaiz0r 9y ago

I'm glad you and the above poster have said this, I also feel very strongly that the web has been completely trapped by coorporate interests. I feel like the web as we know it should be abandoned to coorporations and people that want an open platform for knowledge sharing should start something new that has to stay open.

rusk 9y ago
This is the nub of the net neutrality argument for me. We don't need to "start something different" we just need to ensure that what's there can still be used for both corporations, and the public at large.
eloisant 9y ago
The web is fine, the "closed garden" experiences are in native apps ecosystems.
krapp 9y ago
>I also feel very strongly that the web has been completely trapped by coorporate interests. "corporate interests" haven't trapped the web. People are choosing to pretend that the web has somehow ceased to exist outside of a few silos, or that javascript has no purpose other than to further corporate or media interests, or that Facebook owns HTML now, but none of that is true. The web is just as open as it's ever been. Just because mainstream viewing habits tend to converge towards a few corporate owned social media sites does not mean the web has become owned by corporations, it just means people have gotten lazy and don't want to work to discover new content.
- CaptSpify 9y ago
  This is a joke, right? We are building drm into the browsers themselves now. We are letting companies tell people that "there is no way to access media, unless you go through our walled garden" and defending the company! The open web is farther gone than it's ever been.
  - krapp 9y ago
    I shouldn't have to point this out to someone on Hacker News but browsers are not the web. Facebook is not the web. Twitter is not the web. Not even Google is the web. No one is putting a gun to anyone's head and forcing them to use EME when they distribute media, and it certainly will no more be the case that all media will be forced through DRM and a walled garden than it ever was. The companies that will use this are the companies that would have used DRM anyway, just in another form. The web, as a whole, is unaffected.
    - CaptSpify 9y ago
      Wow, I've heard some bad arguments on here, but this one is great. Good work.
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
Flow 9y ago
We need something like BittorrentYouTube. Something that is somewhat indexed, content can be directly linked to, and there's no-one to control what can be there and what can not. Of course it will be a bit slower at startup times, but it's still faster than a video that has been removed in your country or removed due other arbitrary reasons.
Mindwipe 9y ago
There's nothing to stop you doing all the open platform knowledge sharing on the current web apart from lack of market share of the audience. How moving to a new, less popular distribution mechanism would make that any better is not clear to me.
narrator 9y ago
The only people who are actually serious about creating alternatives to major social media networks are alt-right (for lack of a better word) who have been banned from these services. Of all these alternatives, I think bitchute.com is really innovative in that it has a Bittorrent video viewer that solves the bandwidth usage problem by going p2p. Not a lot of stuff on there yet. For now, that site is mostly full of political content that would get banned, or at least demonitized, on YouTube. I have a hard time getting over the irony that the alt-right are going to be the ones to save the open Internet while the rest of Silicon Valley sits around and does nothing because they need to be protected by the machines of loving grace [1] that are the vast content moderation and filtering apparatus of the major social networks. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Watched_Over_by_Machines_of_Loving_Grace https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Watched_Over_by_Machines...
- icebraining 9y ago
  Bitchute.com is just another centralized system, that happens to offload some of their costs onto their users. Using webtorrent is cute, but no conceptually no different than what early Spotify did. They still control what you're allowed to see.

Angostura 9y ago

I feel differently. For the most part, I still the Web is about freely sharing information - most of the stuff from the good old days of 1998 is still there. However, in addition various companies who otherwise wouldn't put their content on the Web, have to decided to do so, but on the proviso that technology exists that gives them adequate control over how it is distributed. I don't think that's a particularly bad thing.

finchisko 9y ago

Actually that is why you should like web in current form. Google blocked native youtube app, but kept youtube web accessible from amazon devices. IMO there should not be be proprietary app to access youtube or any other service, if the same experience could be delivered for everybody via web. If I owned the Youtube, I'll block Amazon too. They're practically taking advantage and not want to give anything back. Don't want to sell google appliances, don't want to participate in youtube ad program. Only word that came to mind is to describe such a attitude is leech.

anon1385 9y ago
>Actually that is why you should like web in current form. Google blocked native youtube app, but kept youtube web accessible from amazon devices From the article: > Amazon has responded, and its response points to the unfair nature of Google effectively blocking access to the YouTube web site based on the type of device being used to access it. "Echo Show and Fire TV now display a standard web view of YouTube.com and point customers directly to YouTube's existing website," Amazon's statement reads. "Google is setting a disappointing precedent by selectively blocking customer access to an open website. We hope to resolve this with Google as soon as possible."
- finchisko 9y ago
  If you think about it, those statements doesn't make sense. 1. Google effectively blocking access to the YouTube web site based on the type of device being used to access it. 2. Show and Fire TV now display a standard web view of YouTube.com and point customers directly to YouTube's existing website I understood it, that Google blocked Amazon to access youtube via native app. And Amazon reaction was to switch their youtube app to webview, which basically renders web version of youtube.
syshum 9y ago
>Google blocked native youtube app, but kept youtube web accessible from amazon devices. This is false, the app on the fire tv is simply a webview of https://www.youtube.com/tv https://www.youtube.com/tv that is publicly accessible They are not doing any, no my knowledge, more than wrapping that page up in a webview

astura 9y ago

This doesn't make sense, I really don't understand this at all. JavaScript makes the web powerful so more content can be distributed via the Web. Without JavaScript we'd be having much more native apps, not less. The web runs on any platform with a web browser (for the most part), native apps only run from one platform. Crippling the Web leads to more silos.

CaptSpify 9y ago
Javascript takes control from the client and gives it to the server. This is a terrible idea, that has ruined the web. Are there good sides to JS? sure, but they, by far, don't outweigh the bad.
- astura 9y ago
  Nonsense, javascript runs on the client. No javascript = 100% code runs on the server.
  - CaptSpify 9y ago
    Uh yeah, that's my point. Running code from some random server on your machine without verifying it first is a terrible idea. We really need to start seeing the internet as a dark and scary place again. There's too much blind trust nowadays.
    - krapp 9y ago
      How much of the code running on your operating system have you verified before compiling it?
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
      - CaptSpify 9y ago
        A bit. But that's not the point. The point is I can verify it. There's a mountain of difference between the two.