4 ms·

"I will start off by saying that I'm a bit of an oddball. I browse exclusively in private browsing mode." I don't think this is odd at all. I do most browsing

by ken 7y ago

"I will start off by saying that I'm a bit of an oddball. I browse exclusively in private browsing mode." I don't think this is odd at all. I do most browsing in private mode, and I think that should be the default. Letting every random link I click get added to my URL history is just distraction bait later. Password managers and autofill make it easy to log in when I need to. When I'll need to come back to a page later, it's easy to bookmark. Persisting cookies and recording every URL clicked is one of those ideas that was neat 10 years ago, but on the modern web it causes more problems than it solves.

skybrian 7y ago
I think the point is that most people don't do this. (Though it may be common among the sort of people who post on Hacker News.)
- ken 7y ago
  And my point is that it's a better way, so no apology should be needed. It's true most people just go with the defaults, which is why I said it ought to be the default. The "better but oddball" way today has a way of becoming the "default and therefore common" way tomorrow. It'd only take one person at Apple/Google/Microsoft to change this and every website would update their landing page within the week. Anyway, what's the overlap between HN and SO? This used to be exactly the sort of thing where replies would say something like "Most non-technical people don't do this" (or some self-deprecating or pejorative synonym for that), except SO is clearly for highly technical people so we're having to try to slice that pie even thinner to keep it from collapsing into a tautology.
  - skybrian 7y ago
    I think it's mostly a matter of good-enough UI. I got in the habit of opening incognito windows, but I'm not going to teach my relatives to do this.
fortran77 7y ago
_Most_ people in the real world don't. You do realize this, don't you?
- ken 7y ago
  Yes. I thought that was implied by "I think that should be the default", i.e., that this is better behavior but most people won't go to the extra effort, but I can see how it might have been ambiguous.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
UncleMeat 7y ago
> I don't think this is odd at all. I'd wager a ton of money that fewer than 1/1000th of the internet enabled population browses in private modes. I'd guess that the real number is closer to something between 1/10000 and 1/100000.
jarfil 7y ago
> every random link I click get added to my URL history is just distraction bait later Why is that? Maybe I use the history in a different way, but I've never encountered that issue.

by ken 7y ago

skybrian 7y ago

I think the point is that most people don't do this. (Though it may be common among the sort of people who post on Hacker News.)

ken 7y ago
And my point is that it's a better way, so no apology should be needed. It's true most people just go with the defaults, which is why I said it ought to be the default. The "better but oddball" way today has a way of becoming the "default and therefore common" way tomorrow. It'd only take one person at Apple/Google/Microsoft to change this and every website would update their landing page within the week. Anyway, what's the overlap between HN and SO? This used to be exactly the sort of thing where replies would say something like "Most non-technical people don't do this" (or some self-deprecating or pejorative synonym for that), except SO is clearly for highly technical people so we're having to try to slice that pie even thinner to keep it from collapsing into a tautology.
- skybrian 7y ago
  I think it's mostly a matter of good-enough UI. I got in the habit of opening incognito windows, but I'm not going to teach my relatives to do this.

fortran77 7y ago

_Most_ people in the real world don't. You do realize this, don't you?

ken 7y ago
Yes. I thought that was implied by "I think that should be the default", i.e., that this is better behavior but most people won't go to the extra effort, but I can see how it might have been ambiguous.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

UncleMeat 7y ago

> I don't think this is odd at all. I'd wager a ton of money that fewer than 1/1000th of the internet enabled population browses in private modes. I'd guess that the real number is closer to something between 1/10000 and 1/100000.

jarfil 7y ago

> every random link I click get added to my URL history is just distraction bait later Why is that? Maybe I use the history in a different way, but I've never encountered that issue.