5 ms·

5% of people can't view them, yet 25% of top websites use them? In what other industry would it be considered acceptable to exclude 5% of visitors/users/client

5% of people can't view them, yet 25% of top websites use them? In what other industry would it be considered acceptable to exclude 5% of visitors/users/clients?

sjsdaiuasgdia 1y ago
Not all businesses are attempting to reach a market of "every internet user globally".
bawolff 1y ago
Can the 5% view images at all? The number of web crawlers have exploded recently.
- jdiff 1y ago
  Yes, but it's 2% that are still using browsers without full support for WebP according to caniuse, which takes its numbers from StatCounter. https://caniuse.com/webp https://caniuse.com/webp Note that I'm looking at "all tracked," which excludes 2% "other" browsers in the data whose featureset is not known.
0points 1y ago
> 5% of people can't view them, yet 25% of top websites use them? That's not how it works. The server declares what versions of media it has, and the client requests a supported media format. The same trick have been used for audio and video for ages too. Example: <picture> <source srcset="a.webp" type="image/webp"> <img src="fallback.jpg"> </picture>
- vbezhenar 1y ago
  This problem was solved by HTTP since forever. Client sends `Accept` header with supported formats and server selects the necessary content with corresponding `Content-Type` header. You don't need any HTML tags for it.
  - allendoerfer 1y ago
    What about file extensions?
    - jdiff 1y ago
      Sometimes respected, largely ignored. URLs very often don't map directly to files served.
      - allendoerfer 1y ago
        Images almost always do.
        jdiff 1y ago
        I wish, would make my job a good bit easier. Sometimes they don't even respect format query parameters and just use whatever's in your Accept headers. Will say though that it's not universal, it depends heavily on the corner of the internet you're on.
    - georgyo 1y ago
      File extensions are just a hint about what the file might be and have nothing to do with what the file actually is. If the server sets the MIME type, the browser will use that as the hint. But even beyond that, most file formats have a bit of a header at the start of the file that declares the actual format of the file. Browsers already can understand that and use the correct render for a file without an extension.
      - allendoerfer 1y ago
        What if the user wants to use the file outside the browser, where they do not have access to the HTTP headers?
        georgyo 1y ago
        The same is true, if you rename a .png to .jpg and opening it with an image viewer, it will render.
mlok 1y ago
Maybe they offer alternatives to webp for those 5% ? See CSS image-set : https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/image/image-set https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/image/image...
pchangr 1y ago
I can tell you, I have personally worked with a global corporation and we estimated that for one of their websites, supporting the 3% that we exclude by using “modern standards” would be more costly than the amount of revenue they get from them. So in that case, it was a rational decision. And up to the 10% cut, management just didn’t want to do the extra investment. So if something falls below that 10% threshold, they just don’t care to get it fixed.
- Aachen 1y ago
  > it was a rational decision. And up to the 10% cut, management just didn’t want to do the extra investment Rational, or economical? I find it rational to help someone in need since I'd want others to do the same to me, even if it's not financially profitable for me. Imo more factors flow into what's rational, but I understand what you mean by corporate greed working this way (less than 10% of people are blind, neither male nor female, run a free operating system or can't afford a new computer, etc., so yep they're not profitable groups and for-profits don't optimise for that)
  - majewsky 1y ago
    You are using the notion of rationality wrong. Rational reasoning can only help you find how to achieve goals that align with your values. It is strictly worthless in choosing your values. If a corporation has determined that profit maximization is their core tenet, excluding the needs of a minority of users can likely be deduced in a rational manner from that tenet. That is precisely why values need to be forced onto corporate actors through regulation, e.g. in this case through mandatory accessibility guidelines like EU directive 2019/882 that enters into force this very week.
    - account42 1y ago
      Rational reasoning also takes into account long-term and second and higher order effects which quarterly profit-driven reasoning often ignores. If you support 95% of users and your competitor supports 100% then that may help your competitor getting 100% of them while you get none.
pasc1878 1y ago
Any industry. e.g. cars - not everyone is physically able to drive books - blind people can't read music - deaf people can't hear It is a form of 80/20 or 90/10 rule the last small percentage costs as much as the majority.
- danillonunes 1y ago
  I agree with the point you're trying to make, but your examples are terrible. Music industry doesn't have too much to do to help deaf people. It's not like they're deliberately making deaf-inaccessible music instead of relying on the old good deaf-accessible music formats. (Also, the parent comment's example is also not so good because as someone else pointed just because the top 25% websites are serving webp it does mean they're not serving alternative formats for those who does not support it, as this is quite trivial to setup)

5% of people can't view them, yet 25% of top websites use them? In what other industry would it be considered acceptable to exclude 5% of visitors/users/clients?

sjsdaiuasgdia 1y ago

Not all businesses are attempting to reach a market of "every internet user globally".

bawolff 1y ago

Can the 5% view images at all? The number of web crawlers have exploded recently.

jdiff 1y ago
Yes, but it's 2% that are still using browsers without full support for WebP according to caniuse, which takes its numbers from StatCounter. https://caniuse.com/webp https://caniuse.com/webp Note that I'm looking at "all tracked," which excludes 2% "other" browsers in the data whose featureset is not known.

0points 1y ago

> 5% of people can't view them, yet 25% of top websites use them? That's not how it works. The server declares what versions of media it has, and the client requests a supported media format. The same trick have been used for audio and video for ages too. Example: <picture> <source srcset="a.webp" type="image/webp"> <img src="fallback.jpg"> </picture>

vbezhenar 1y ago
This problem was solved by HTTP since forever. Client sends `Accept` header with supported formats and server selects the necessary content with corresponding `Content-Type` header. You don't need any HTML tags for it.
- allendoerfer 1y ago
  What about file extensions?
  - jdiff 1y ago
    Sometimes respected, largely ignored. URLs very often don't map directly to files served.
    - allendoerfer 1y ago
      Images almost always do.
      - jdiff 1y ago
        I wish, would make my job a good bit easier. Sometimes they don't even respect format query parameters and just use whatever's in your Accept headers. Will say though that it's not universal, it depends heavily on the corner of the internet you're on.
  - georgyo 1y ago
    File extensions are just a hint about what the file might be and have nothing to do with what the file actually is. If the server sets the MIME type, the browser will use that as the hint. But even beyond that, most file formats have a bit of a header at the start of the file that declares the actual format of the file. Browsers already can understand that and use the correct render for a file without an extension.
    - allendoerfer 1y ago
      What if the user wants to use the file outside the browser, where they do not have access to the HTTP headers?
      - georgyo 1y ago
        The same is true, if you rename a .png to .jpg and opening it with an image viewer, it will render.

mlok 1y ago

Maybe they offer alternatives to webp for those 5% ? See CSS image-set : https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/image/image-set https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/image/image...

pchangr 1y ago

I can tell you, I have personally worked with a global corporation and we estimated that for one of their websites, supporting the 3% that we exclude by using “modern standards” would be more costly than the amount of revenue they get from them. So in that case, it was a rational decision. And up to the 10% cut, management just didn’t want to do the extra investment. So if something falls below that 10% threshold, they just don’t care to get it fixed.

Aachen 1y ago
> it was a rational decision. And up to the 10% cut, management just didn’t want to do the extra investment Rational, or economical? I find it rational to help someone in need since I'd want others to do the same to me, even if it's not financially profitable for me. Imo more factors flow into what's rational, but I understand what you mean by corporate greed working this way (less than 10% of people are blind, neither male nor female, run a free operating system or can't afford a new computer, etc., so yep they're not profitable groups and for-profits don't optimise for that)
- majewsky 1y ago
  You are using the notion of rationality wrong. Rational reasoning can only help you find how to achieve goals that align with your values. It is strictly worthless in choosing your values. If a corporation has determined that profit maximization is their core tenet, excluding the needs of a minority of users can likely be deduced in a rational manner from that tenet. That is precisely why values need to be forced onto corporate actors through regulation, e.g. in this case through mandatory accessibility guidelines like EU directive 2019/882 that enters into force this very week.
  - account42 1y ago
    Rational reasoning also takes into account long-term and second and higher order effects which quarterly profit-driven reasoning often ignores. If you support 95% of users and your competitor supports 100% then that may help your competitor getting 100% of them while you get none.

pasc1878 1y ago

Any industry. e.g. cars - not everyone is physically able to drive books - blind people can't read music - deaf people can't hear It is a form of 80/20 or 90/10 rule the last small percentage costs as much as the majority.

danillonunes 1y ago
I agree with the point you're trying to make, but your examples are terrible. Music industry doesn't have too much to do to help deaf people. It's not like they're deliberately making deaf-inaccessible music instead of relying on the old good deaf-accessible music formats. (Also, the parent comment's example is also not so good because as someone else pointed just because the top 25% websites are serving webp it does mean they're not serving alternative formats for those who does not support it, as this is quite trivial to setup)