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The web has come a long way and expectations from consumers have evolved over the years. While admittedly a lot of the bloat likely comes from negative things l

by lunaru 8y ago

The web has come a long way and expectations from consumers have evolved over the years. While admittedly a lot of the bloat likely comes from negative things like trackers, ads, etc there are also assets loaded on a typical page that genuinely enhance the user experience. On the list, Google Mail scores the highest in terms of bloat, but it's a full web app and daily users probably have come to be spoiled on some of the UX niceness that makes Google Mail enjoyable to use. Users would rather have that vs a plain HTML page with links. The empirical evidence is clear on that, otherwise the web would not have evolved as it did. Software is built on layers of abstraction[0], and necessarily, there will be bloat as a byproduct of layering. If we had to map out complexity of what's really going on in a typical computer, the "bloat" floating at the top layer caused by JavaScript would be put to shame by the complexity in the underlying browser and the OS underneath that, all of which arguably are too "bloated" for 90% of daily use. [0] https://xkcd.com/676/ https://xkcd.com/676/

mook 8y ago
I wonder how Gmail as it originally came out (during the invite-only stage) compares to Gmail now? That already had a lot of the functionality (but not, say, chat). Of course, it's rather difficult to go back in time to measure the old interface now.
tannhaeuser 8y ago
> Users would rather have [bloated JS webmail] vs a plain HTML page with links. The empirical evidence is clear on that, otherwise the web would not have evolved as it did. There's got to be a special name for this kind of logical fallacy. > Software is built on layers of abstraction, and necessarily, there will be bloat as a byproduct of layering. Except we're layering less powerful, less abstracted APIs over an already high-level document model, or we're layering a primitive record access API over SQL.
- anewhnaccount2 8y ago
  >There's got to be a special name for this kind of logical fallacy. Similar to https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis perhaps?
- shaki-dora 8y ago
  > There's got to be a special name for this kind of logical fallacy. There also needs to be a Fallacy fallacy: the irrational believe that merely dropping the "fallacy" moniker is an argument. In this case: Yes, considering there are many hosted email services competing for customers, with quite a lot of variation between "huge web app" and "minimalistic list of links". And considering Google is known to excessively A/B test any change (including more-complex v. just-html interfaces), it's quite valid to conclude that people generally prefer what GMail is doing. GMail even has a fallback html interface it switches to when noticing slowdowns. The number of people keeping that mode on manually (few) is another indicator of people's preferences. > Except we're layering less powerful, less abstracted APIs over an already high-level document model[...] "Abstract" != "good". Abstraction layers can be stupid, or deliberately constricted. They are still, tautologically, by definition, one step more "abstract" than the API they access.
- TeMPOraL 8y ago
  > There's got to be a special name for this kind of logical fallacy. Voting-with-your-wallet fallacy? Users choose from what's available on the market. Between high marketing, network effects and lack of technical understanding of the average user, there is close to zero feedback going back to service providers. The providers get to unilaterally decide what's on the market, and users have no choice but to take it.
worble 8y ago
Funny you use gmail as the example, since I use the basic html version of gmail[0] whenever I can, and find a vastly superior experience for just, yknow, reading my emails. [0] https://support.google.com/mail/answer/15049?hl=en https://support.google.com/mail/answer/15049?hl=en
- michaericalribo 8y ago
  I do the same, especially as my laptop dies a slow and painful death...do you know of any browser extensions etc that reduce a page’s overhead? I want a basic html version of the entire web...
  - worble 8y ago
    Other than using ublock/umatrix to block as much 3rd party crud as possible, there's not much else you can do since most sites will be tightly coupled to their javascript. If you're lucky, certain popular websites have their own extensions, such as Alternate Player for Twitch.tv[0], which help make the experience quicker and nicer, but you'll have to search for these if they exist. [0] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/twitch_5/?src=search https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/twitch_5/?src...
- sb8244 8y ago
  That's great, for you. However, many users utilize the wide feature set that it provides and power their business on top of that feature set. Should you have to pay the price for that? Probably not. I like the you have a way to avoid the things you don't need and save memory and time.
AHTERIX5000 8y ago
> While admittedly a lot of the bloat likely comes from negative things like trackers, ads, etc there are also assets loaded on a typical page that genuinely enhance the user experience. Such as? (genuinely curious)

by lunaru 8y ago

mook 8y ago

I wonder how Gmail as it originally came out (during the invite-only stage) compares to Gmail now? That already had a lot of the functionality (but not, say, chat). Of course, it's rather difficult to go back in time to measure the old interface now.

tannhaeuser 8y ago

> Users would rather have [bloated JS webmail] vs a plain HTML page with links. The empirical evidence is clear on that, otherwise the web would not have evolved as it did. There's got to be a special name for this kind of logical fallacy. > Software is built on layers of abstraction, and necessarily, there will be bloat as a byproduct of layering. Except we're layering less powerful, less abstracted APIs over an already high-level document model, or we're layering a primitive record access API over SQL.

anewhnaccount2 8y ago
>There's got to be a special name for this kind of logical fallacy. Similar to https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis perhaps?
shaki-dora 8y ago
> There's got to be a special name for this kind of logical fallacy. There also needs to be a Fallacy fallacy: the irrational believe that merely dropping the "fallacy" moniker is an argument. In this case: Yes, considering there are many hosted email services competing for customers, with quite a lot of variation between "huge web app" and "minimalistic list of links". And considering Google is known to excessively A/B test any change (including more-complex v. just-html interfaces), it's quite valid to conclude that people generally prefer what GMail is doing. GMail even has a fallback html interface it switches to when noticing slowdowns. The number of people keeping that mode on manually (few) is another indicator of people's preferences. > Except we're layering less powerful, less abstracted APIs over an already high-level document model[...] "Abstract" != "good". Abstraction layers can be stupid, or deliberately constricted. They are still, tautologically, by definition, one step more "abstract" than the API they access.
TeMPOraL 8y ago
> There's got to be a special name for this kind of logical fallacy. Voting-with-your-wallet fallacy? Users choose from what's available on the market. Between high marketing, network effects and lack of technical understanding of the average user, there is close to zero feedback going back to service providers. The providers get to unilaterally decide what's on the market, and users have no choice but to take it.

worble 8y ago

Funny you use gmail as the example, since I use the basic html version of gmail[0] whenever I can, and find a vastly superior experience for just, yknow, reading my emails. [0] https://support.google.com/mail/answer/15049?hl=en https://support.google.com/mail/answer/15049?hl=en

michaericalribo 8y ago
I do the same, especially as my laptop dies a slow and painful death...do you know of any browser extensions etc that reduce a page’s overhead? I want a basic html version of the entire web...
- worble 8y ago
  Other than using ublock/umatrix to block as much 3rd party crud as possible, there's not much else you can do since most sites will be tightly coupled to their javascript. If you're lucky, certain popular websites have their own extensions, such as Alternate Player for Twitch.tv[0], which help make the experience quicker and nicer, but you'll have to search for these if they exist. [0] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/twitch_5/?src=search https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/twitch_5/?src...
sb8244 8y ago
That's great, for you. However, many users utilize the wide feature set that it provides and power their business on top of that feature set. Should you have to pay the price for that? Probably not. I like the you have a way to avoid the things you don't need and save memory and time.

AHTERIX5000 8y ago

> While admittedly a lot of the bloat likely comes from negative things like trackers, ads, etc there are also assets loaded on a typical page that genuinely enhance the user experience. Such as? (genuinely curious)