4 ms·
If all sites had proper favicons for branding we could start dropping site name from page titles and focus just on the content.
by bergie 16y ago
If all sites had proper favicons for branding we could start dropping site name from page titles and focus just on the content.
- Semiapies 16y agoBecause we could usefully distinguish billions of sites by their tiny little icons? ETA: To expand, I just opened the top 12 stories on HN right this moment in new tabs. I recognized the NYT logo in one favicon and the Apple logo in another. Of the other eight that did have favicons, those little icons told me absolutely nothing useful. A few of those sites did indicate their names in the titles, however.
- frisco 16y agoDo you really regularly visit billions of sites?
- Semiapies 16y agoI visit more than a handful. How useful do you think a dozen unfamiliar favicons on my tabs or bookmarks are? And why would I have to visit billions of sites? The issue is that billions of sites exist, and a random little picture tells me nothing about what site it's from unless I already have it memorized.
- scdlbx 16y agoI can distinguish the icons of every site I visit on a semi-regular basis.
- Semiapies 16y agoAnd you never visit any other sites? How useful to you is an unfamiliar favicon, or a row of tabs with an assortment of unfamiliar favicons?
- scdlbx 16y agoAn unfamiliar favicon lets me know I am not somewhere I normally would be, and to regard the site I am at more suspiciously. Without familiar favicons, I would treat every site that way before looking at the page more thoroughly. Obviously I do not rely solely on favicons, but they are a good initial way of orienting myself when looking at tabs.
- Semiapies 16y agoIn other words, the favicon is only useful for familiar sites or for knowing a page isn't from a familiar site. It's of absolutely no use in any other case, whereas a site name or a domain in the title tag will actually tell me what the site is in all cases.
- bigiain 16y agoThere is a meta pattern I recognise in my tab bar sometimes - I get pairs of unfamiliarfavicon:hackernewsfavicon. That it actually quite useful when I flick back to a random browser window after being distracted... ("Ahhh, that's my timewasting window!")
- m0th87 16y agoI guess you're not blind :) Having only icons would be such an accessibility disaster.
- bergie 16y agoDo you really want to distinguish a site by the title attribute? Think about it, a site already has two "branding elements": favicon and domain. Why not leave the title for just content, the thing that the site visitor is most likely interested in?
- Semiapies 16y agoI don't know about you, but domains don't show up on my tabs or my bookmarks (unless I open one's properties). Only the title and the favicon do, and unlike the favicon, the title isn't a tiny picture that's only useful if I go to a site enough to recognize it.
- jbri 16y agoIf you bookmarked a page on an unfamiliar site, chances are it's the content of the page that you bookmarked it for, not the name of the site.
- Semiapies 16y ago1) Then why worry about the favicon? You're being circular. 2) Chances are also that I might want to know which site something came from at a glance.
- ghshephard 16y agoThat works for Tabs - I just spent 10 minutes watching my browsing behavior, and realized the only thing I look at in Tabs, is the Favicon. Personally, Google has replaced my bookmarking behavior. I don't bookmark pages any more - when I need to search for them, I just google for the appropriate keywords. In fact, this works so well, it's rare that I even need to add a "site:" to give a hint as to which site to look for it.
- chime 16y agoI use Google to search my own sites. Typing 'tip my' into Google takes me to my 'Tip of my Tongue' page faster than looking for the bookmark in my browser.
- ayu 16y agoI like how Chrome remembers the sites I've visited the most and autocompletes them in the nav bar. Usually I'll pop open a new tab, type a letter (e.g. "s" for slickdeals") and hit enter. 2 letters takes care of any site I visit on a semi-regular basis.
- Raphael 16y agoI bookmark pages I want to visit later and take advantage of the location field to search my bookmarks, as I am paranoid a www search engine might forget about my obscure page.
- colanderman 16y agoDownside: favicons don't have alt attributes; this would impair accessibility.
- btig 16y agoFor my bookmarks bar, I remove the title. http://i.imgur.com/eRjJP.png http://i.imgur.com/eRjJP.png
- petercooper 16y agoA lot of sites already do that. In reality it should work fine because searches also include the URL so you can easily see the source (same idea as used by HN items). Titles are easier to fake so can't be entirely trusted anyway.