4 ms·

google amp is a plague on the internet and should have been shutdown by regulators. it is definitely anti-competitive. i am sick and tired of our government com

google amp is a plague on the internet and should have been shutdown by regulators. it is definitely anti-competitive. i am sick and tired of our government completely slaving to the big tech companies when it comes to regulations and anti-competitive behavior. google amp on mobile overrides behavior on mobile, even on android, so instead of web links opening up in the respective and selected default app, it opens up the amp link within google search or the browser. there is no way to turn off this feature on any browser, chrome or not.

tjoff 7y ago
Unless I misunderstood, that is something you disable in each (google)app that has that "feature". In Gmail for instance: settings: General settings: Open links in gmail. Turn on for "faster" browsing. Default is on. Tip: Use firefox focus instead as the default browser to open all links. If the link warrants further look copy the url to your main browser. The above has nothing to do with amp. But to not detract, amp truly is a plague.
- nikofeyn 7y ago
  if you use google search as your default search, then there is no way i know of to disable amp, no matter which browser you use, even if you request the browser to handle opening the link. google search passes the amp link to the browser.
- rpastuszak 7y ago
  Thanks for the tip. Most of the people here would fix that somehow, e.g. by tweaking browser settings, finding and following comments like yours. But, why does someone who doesn't deal with tech have to think about that, and will they, should they? I find their UX approach to SEO more concerning than, say, scoring. For example, AMP pages will receive the same score as equally performant non-AMP content. However, they won't benefit from the carousel view, with instant page loads (prefetch), etc... Small changes like this, applied at a huge scale to a user base that just can't afford to constantly fight hostile UX are damaging, regardless if they come from Google, an airline site, your mailbox switching to "Promotions" at random intervals or Twitter not allowing you to permanently change the feed order. Internet feels more hostile than it used to. I don't mind the trolls (I can always block them) but I do mind that we depend on services that deploy hostile UX practices.
  - tripzilch 7y ago
    > Internet feels more hostile than it used to. It's not Internet, it's software. You can really feel it when switching from Android to LineageOS, or from Windows to Linux. It's the difference between software where "you are the product" and software that has been created to serve the user, to be the best tool it can be. I'm not talking about UX in the sense that open source software can sometimes feel clunky and unfinished, but I'm talking about breath of freedom you feel when you switch, and suddenly ... you notice that this current you have been forced to swim against, just isn't there any more. I helped a friend get LineageOS on his bootlooped phone, and he's so happy with it. All these features in the settings that are actually helpful (when in Android you always have to second guess, you know that feeling when a setting's description is really vague and uninformative, "this is probably going to spy on me", is it vaguely positive or negative, because the switch can go either way). All the very basic features that would otherwise require an ad-filled app to perform, of course already there. You get privacy controls that aren't mystifying or reset on updates. Similarly, I've now been on Instagram for about half a year. Always avoided FB, but there's some art I wanted to put out there, so I gave it a try. And oh my god, Instagram is probably the shittiest software ever? Or at least the most user hostile. It's a social thing where you can share images, comments and messages. Except it isn't, it just appears like one. Literally every interaction feels forced, to show me more ads, make me spend more time in this app (??) and mainly constantly throwing up barriers against interacting with any kind of software or data outside its ecosystem. You can't upload from your laptop, many links are not clickable, many text fields are not copyable, most features in the browser are locked unless you make it pretend to be an iPhone (!!), you can't post or reply to comments. The chat is such basic functionality that it seems hard to fuck up but they did. I should stop, but I can go on ... This is that feeling of constantly swimming against a current, and somehow we're tricked into believing that is how it's supposed to be, because ... I don't know, some people told me when I complained, that most people don't use instagram in the way I do. Well I guess, but that doesn't seem to be most people's choice.
    - twoelfer 7y ago
      Totally agree with the Instagram part. Worst software ever.
- Kwpolska 7y ago
  This is not AMP. It’s a feature originally called Chrome Custom Tabs [1], and it’s a faster way to open a webpage than a regular “open URL” intent (that would have to launch the entire browser app) or a custom WebView (which sucks for other reasons). The thing is, this feature takes into account your default browser, so if you set Focus as your system default browser, the custom tabs will launch in Focus, with all the privacy protections it offers. [1] https://developer.chrome.com/multidevice/android/customtabs https://developer.chrome.com/multidevice/android/customtabs
- tripzilch 7y ago
  > Unless I misunderstood, that is something you disable in each (google)app that has that "feature". > In Gmail for instance: settings: General settings: > Open links in gmail. Turn on for "faster" browsing. I changed this setting, but now I clicked a link in gmail and indeed it opens via Firefox, but it still gets redirected through a google-URL before getting to the real page. I want to disable that behaviour most of all.
  - sm4rk0 7y ago
    Then use a generic email client instead of Gmail mobile app or web email interface.
    - SmellyGeekBoy 7y ago
      The Fastmail app is very good, for example.
- spurgu 7y ago
  > Tip: Use firefox focus instead as the default browser to open all links. Unfortunately iOS doesn't support this nearly as well as Android does. On Android you can enforce this pretty much everywhere whereas on iOS a bunch of apps still open links in Safari no matter what you do.
zyx321 7y ago
Semi-off-topic, but I recently found out that there is an even worse version of AMP, called Google Web Light. Running Firefox on an ARM device (e.g. Raspberry Pi), the results speak for themselves [1]. Notably, there is absolutely no way for the end user to disable it, short of spoofing your user agent. [1] https://googleweblight.com/i?u=https://news.ycombinator.com/&hl=en-US&f=1 https://googleweblight.com/i?u=https://news.ycombinator.com/...
- mcbain 7y ago
  Truthful name, though? Google, we blight.
- JetSpiegel 7y ago
  The Opera Mini MITM has returned!
Angostura 7y ago
Its been enough to make me change my iPhone's search default to DDG. I've been using it for about a month and I'm surprisingly happy with the results so far.
- stiray 7y ago
  Me too, but lately I am experimenting with qwant.com, also love the results.
hjek 7y ago
> there is no way to turn off this feature on any browser, chrome or not. Here is a way for Firefox: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/amp2html/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/amp2html/

tjoff 7y ago

Unless I misunderstood, that is something you disable in each (google)app that has that "feature". In Gmail for instance: settings: General settings: Open links in gmail. Turn on for "faster" browsing. Default is on. Tip: Use firefox focus instead as the default browser to open all links. If the link warrants further look copy the url to your main browser. The above has nothing to do with amp. But to not detract, amp truly is a plague.

nikofeyn 7y ago
if you use google search as your default search, then there is no way i know of to disable amp, no matter which browser you use, even if you request the browser to handle opening the link. google search passes the amp link to the browser.
rpastuszak 7y ago
Thanks for the tip. Most of the people here would fix that somehow, e.g. by tweaking browser settings, finding and following comments like yours. But, why does someone who doesn't deal with tech have to think about that, and will they, should they? I find their UX approach to SEO more concerning than, say, scoring. For example, AMP pages will receive the same score as equally performant non-AMP content. However, they won't benefit from the carousel view, with instant page loads (prefetch), etc... Small changes like this, applied at a huge scale to a user base that just can't afford to constantly fight hostile UX are damaging, regardless if they come from Google, an airline site, your mailbox switching to "Promotions" at random intervals or Twitter not allowing you to permanently change the feed order. Internet feels more hostile than it used to. I don't mind the trolls (I can always block them) but I do mind that we depend on services that deploy hostile UX practices.
- tripzilch 7y ago
  > Internet feels more hostile than it used to. It's not Internet, it's software. You can really feel it when switching from Android to LineageOS, or from Windows to Linux. It's the difference between software where "you are the product" and software that has been created to serve the user, to be the best tool it can be. I'm not talking about UX in the sense that open source software can sometimes feel clunky and unfinished, but I'm talking about breath of freedom you feel when you switch, and suddenly ... you notice that this current you have been forced to swim against, just isn't there any more. I helped a friend get LineageOS on his bootlooped phone, and he's so happy with it. All these features in the settings that are actually helpful (when in Android you always have to second guess, you know that feeling when a setting's description is really vague and uninformative, "this is probably going to spy on me", is it vaguely positive or negative, because the switch can go either way). All the very basic features that would otherwise require an ad-filled app to perform, of course already there. You get privacy controls that aren't mystifying or reset on updates. Similarly, I've now been on Instagram for about half a year. Always avoided FB, but there's some art I wanted to put out there, so I gave it a try. And oh my god, Instagram is probably the shittiest software ever? Or at least the most user hostile. It's a social thing where you can share images, comments and messages. Except it isn't, it just appears like one. Literally every interaction feels forced, to show me more ads, make me spend more time in this app (??) and mainly constantly throwing up barriers against interacting with any kind of software or data outside its ecosystem. You can't upload from your laptop, many links are not clickable, many text fields are not copyable, most features in the browser are locked unless you make it pretend to be an iPhone (!!), you can't post or reply to comments. The chat is such basic functionality that it seems hard to fuck up but they did. I should stop, but I can go on ... This is that feeling of constantly swimming against a current, and somehow we're tricked into believing that is how it's supposed to be, because ... I don't know, some people told me when I complained, that most people don't use instagram in the way I do. Well I guess, but that doesn't seem to be most people's choice.
  - twoelfer 7y ago
    Totally agree with the Instagram part. Worst software ever.
Kwpolska 7y ago
This is not AMP. It’s a feature originally called Chrome Custom Tabs [1], and it’s a faster way to open a webpage than a regular “open URL” intent (that would have to launch the entire browser app) or a custom WebView (which sucks for other reasons). The thing is, this feature takes into account your default browser, so if you set Focus as your system default browser, the custom tabs will launch in Focus, with all the privacy protections it offers. [1] https://developer.chrome.com/multidevice/android/customtabs https://developer.chrome.com/multidevice/android/customtabs
tripzilch 7y ago
> Unless I misunderstood, that is something you disable in each (google)app that has that "feature". > In Gmail for instance: settings: General settings: > Open links in gmail. Turn on for "faster" browsing. I changed this setting, but now I clicked a link in gmail and indeed it opens via Firefox, but it still gets redirected through a google-URL before getting to the real page. I want to disable that behaviour most of all.
- sm4rk0 7y ago
  Then use a generic email client instead of Gmail mobile app or web email interface.
  - SmellyGeekBoy 7y ago
    The Fastmail app is very good, for example.
spurgu 7y ago
> Tip: Use firefox focus instead as the default browser to open all links. Unfortunately iOS doesn't support this nearly as well as Android does. On Android you can enforce this pretty much everywhere whereas on iOS a bunch of apps still open links in Safari no matter what you do.

zyx321 7y ago

Semi-off-topic, but I recently found out that there is an even worse version of AMP, called Google Web Light. Running Firefox on an ARM device (e.g. Raspberry Pi), the results speak for themselves [1]. Notably, there is absolutely no way for the end user to disable it, short of spoofing your user agent. [1] https://googleweblight.com/i?u=https://news.ycombinator.com/&hl=en-US&f=1 https://googleweblight.com/i?u=https://news.ycombinator.com/...

mcbain 7y ago
Truthful name, though? Google, we blight.
JetSpiegel 7y ago
The Opera Mini MITM has returned!

Angostura 7y ago

Its been enough to make me change my iPhone's search default to DDG. I've been using it for about a month and I'm surprisingly happy with the results so far.

stiray 7y ago
Me too, but lately I am experimenting with qwant.com, also love the results.

hjek 7y ago

> there is no way to turn off this feature on any browser, chrome or not. Here is a way for Firefox: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/amp2html/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/amp2html/