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> Sometimes I get blank pages. I got them very frequently (as a user). This coupled with the inability to turn off AMP finally pushed me to use DDG as the defa

by Boulth 8y ago

> Sometimes I get blank pages. I got them very frequently (as a user). This coupled with the inability to turn off AMP finally pushed me to use DDG as the default search engine.

kurthr 8y ago
For several months AMP regularly (70-80%) caused pages to fail to load from Google News through a Chrome browser on Android M. Often after several reload attempts it would work, but sometimes not. Loading through Firefox was always a work around, but URL copy and paste was annoying. I figured it was just tehGoog reminding me to pay attention to other human beings rather than staring at my phone. Then they fixed it with some update, when they realized I was incorrigible (actually I never figured out why).
RexM 8y ago
AMP also pushed me to switch to DDG as my default search engine.
- nate 8y ago
  That's really interesting. I wonder if @yegg knows about this. Might be another nice marketing topic he can explore.
- dreamcompiler 8y ago
  Same here. AMP is Google's own walled garden, and that plus Google's pervasive tracking finally pushed me to DDG. Enough is enough.
Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
Google actually deliberately makes the page blank with an 8 second animation to show it again. They remove this animation in JavaScript. https://www.ampproject.org/docs/fundamentals/spec/amp-boilerplate https://www.ampproject.org/docs/fundamentals/spec/amp-boiler...
- ww520 8y ago
  Is that right? What's the purpose of having an 8 second blank page animation?
  - Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
    Prevent FOUC? Punish users who block third party scripts? Who knows.
    - JoshMnem 8y ago
      > Punish users who block third party scripts? Yes, probably that. I get the 8 second delay because I block all 3rd party scripts by default.
- dasmoth 8y ago
  I guess this is there as an “avoid showing unstyled content at any cost” thing. But really, WTF?
  - kevingadd 8y ago
    "Let's make the web fast and light! Users will love it!" "Also let's artificially hide content so it feels like it loads slower. Users will love it!" The aversion to flashes of unstyled content is so absurd sometimes...
whatshisface 8y ago
So that's what has been happening! I've been so confused lately as to why Google links would fail to forward me to the website I clicked on, leaving a blank page and a massive google.com query string in my address bar. Sometimes refreshing the page has not worked, forcing me to manually copy and paste the address off of the search results. Someone should write a browser plugin that uses the little green URL instead of the <a> in all Google links.
- taylorfinley 8y ago
  There's an excellent chrome extension called Skip Redirect that does this universally. Whitelisting is really simple too if it causes any problems. It decodes urls like "https://out.reddit.com/t3_747gsgju?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsitelinked.tld%2Fpage.html" https://out.reddit.com/t3_747gsgju?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsitelin... and strips out the tracking strings and other nonsense and sends you straight to (in this example case) "https://sitelinked.tld/page.html" https://sitelinked.tld/page.html"
_arvin 8y ago
I've been using duckduckgo exclusively for a year now on all my devices and I'm loving it. The whole point of a search engine is to give you what you're looking for, and ddg delivers. If I ever need to Google something, I'll use !g query. You can make it look really nice also by changing it from the Default theme to Basic.
- zwkrt 8y ago
  For me the "killer app" of Google search is location based searches. DDG is great but when I want to find a Petco nearby I don't want to use Yelp.
  - Twirrim 8y ago
    If you put "!g" at the start of your search, DDG automatically redirects you to the search result in google. I've been using DDG as my search engine for about 2 1/2 years now, and I find absolutely no reason to go back to Google other than location search, and DDG proxies that easily.
  - binomialxenon 8y ago
    I don't have any problem with just searching strings such as "coffee shop [city name]", etc.
    - bhhaskin 8y ago
      Right. If I want to add that location based context it is up to me as a user, and not automatically assumed.
  - codazoda 8y ago
    I always open Google Maps in this case; not the browser. Just my habit, I suppose.
  - fudoo 8y ago
    Then why does Google constantly think I'm a city over? If their killer app is location search they suck at it.
dhimes 8y ago
You'll be happy to know that I've been using DDG for a couple of years now and have no idea what this thread is about.
mikestew 8y ago
Thus explaining why I'm mystified by what everyone is complaining about. For at least the last couple of years (whenever iOS allowed DDG as default search engine) I've used pretty much nothing but DDG. I'm guessing I've probably never seen an AMP page (certainly not that I've noticed).
macca321 8y ago
Me too, on a Sony Xperiea. Got a new phone and the problem went away

by Boulth 8y ago

> Sometimes I get blank pages. I got them very frequently (as a user). This coupled with the inability to turn off AMP finally pushed me to use DDG as the default search engine.

kurthr 8y ago

For several months AMP regularly (70-80%) caused pages to fail to load from Google News through a Chrome browser on Android M. Often after several reload attempts it would work, but sometimes not. Loading through Firefox was always a work around, but URL copy and paste was annoying. I figured it was just tehGoog reminding me to pay attention to other human beings rather than staring at my phone. Then they fixed it with some update, when they realized I was incorrigible (actually I never figured out why).

RexM 8y ago

AMP also pushed me to switch to DDG as my default search engine.

nate 8y ago
That's really interesting. I wonder if @yegg knows about this. Might be another nice marketing topic he can explore.
dreamcompiler 8y ago
Same here. AMP is Google's own walled garden, and that plus Google's pervasive tracking finally pushed me to DDG. Enough is enough.

Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago

Google actually deliberately makes the page blank with an 8 second animation to show it again. They remove this animation in JavaScript. https://www.ampproject.org/docs/fundamentals/spec/amp-boilerplate https://www.ampproject.org/docs/fundamentals/spec/amp-boiler...

ww520 8y ago
Is that right? What's the purpose of having an 8 second blank page animation?
- Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
  Prevent FOUC? Punish users who block third party scripts? Who knows.
  - JoshMnem 8y ago
    > Punish users who block third party scripts? Yes, probably that. I get the 8 second delay because I block all 3rd party scripts by default.
dasmoth 8y ago
I guess this is there as an “avoid showing unstyled content at any cost” thing. But really, WTF?
- kevingadd 8y ago
  "Let's make the web fast and light! Users will love it!" "Also let's artificially hide content so it feels like it loads slower. Users will love it!" The aversion to flashes of unstyled content is so absurd sometimes...

whatshisface 8y ago

So that's what has been happening! I've been so confused lately as to why Google links would fail to forward me to the website I clicked on, leaving a blank page and a massive google.com query string in my address bar. Sometimes refreshing the page has not worked, forcing me to manually copy and paste the address off of the search results. Someone should write a browser plugin that uses the little green URL instead of the <a> in all Google links.

taylorfinley 8y ago
There's an excellent chrome extension called Skip Redirect that does this universally. Whitelisting is really simple too if it causes any problems. It decodes urls like "https://out.reddit.com/t3_747gsgju?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsitelinked.tld%2Fpage.html" https://out.reddit.com/t3_747gsgju?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsitelin... and strips out the tracking strings and other nonsense and sends you straight to (in this example case) "https://sitelinked.tld/page.html" https://sitelinked.tld/page.html"

_arvin 8y ago

I've been using duckduckgo exclusively for a year now on all my devices and I'm loving it. The whole point of a search engine is to give you what you're looking for, and ddg delivers. If I ever need to Google something, I'll use !g query. You can make it look really nice also by changing it from the Default theme to Basic.

zwkrt 8y ago
For me the "killer app" of Google search is location based searches. DDG is great but when I want to find a Petco nearby I don't want to use Yelp.
- Twirrim 8y ago
  If you put "!g" at the start of your search, DDG automatically redirects you to the search result in google. I've been using DDG as my search engine for about 2 1/2 years now, and I find absolutely no reason to go back to Google other than location search, and DDG proxies that easily.
- binomialxenon 8y ago
  I don't have any problem with just searching strings such as "coffee shop [city name]", etc.
  - bhhaskin 8y ago
    Right. If I want to add that location based context it is up to me as a user, and not automatically assumed.
- codazoda 8y ago
  I always open Google Maps in this case; not the browser. Just my habit, I suppose.
- fudoo 8y ago
  Then why does Google constantly think I'm a city over? If their killer app is location search they suck at it.

dhimes 8y ago

You'll be happy to know that I've been using DDG for a couple of years now and have no idea what this thread is about.

mikestew 8y ago

Thus explaining why I'm mystified by what everyone is complaining about. For at least the last couple of years (whenever iOS allowed DDG as default search engine) I've used pretty much nothing but DDG. I'm guessing I've probably never seen an AMP page (certainly not that I've noticed).

macca321 8y ago

Me too, on a Sony Xperiea. Got a new phone and the problem went away