
Google, Twitter and Publishers Seek Faster Web - dankohn1
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/12/technology/google-twitter-and-publishers-seek-faster-web.html
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thomasfoster96
Can someone who works on web development for a major publisher please try and
explain why such sites take so long to load?

Just by opening devtools in Chrome I can tell that a lot of sites aren't
bothering to minify HTML, aren't bothering to asynchronously load JavaScript,
include more frameworks and widgets than anyone could possibly use and don't
bother to cache anything (or cache very little). And with all the pointless
junk they include, they still can't use proper HTML tags and attributes nor
include some basic accessibility features.

I really hate having to reload pages because something didn't load properly or
having to turn off JavaScript and/or images just because a site is loading a
huge file that is blocking the display of a paragraphs of text. I know some
people like to use something like Lynx or only allow HTML to be loaded - but
my web browsing shouldn't have to become sadistic.

Making Google, Twitter or Facebook load news articles is a terrible
alternative. Given the wide array of compression tools, caching (including
service workers on >40% of browsers, appcache on >90% and pretty much everyone
having HTTP caching) and the sheer amount of information on improving website
performance that's out there, making news websites load fast really should be
a solved problem that doesn't need Google to solve it.

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pornel
> Can someone who works on web development for a major publisher please try
> and explain why such sites take so long to load?

1\. The ad/tracking industry seems to be incapable of writing JavaScript that
is not awful. I don't have insight why that happens, but all the scripts I had
to deal with were layers upon layers of document.write, iframes, redirects and
copy&pasted JS from the Netscape 4 era. Even when somebody tries to fix it,
the best they can do is to add one more layer of scripts on top of the rotting
pile.

2\. Business deals are made with no consideration of 3rd party's code quality
and performance impact. Once the deal is signed the developers are just tasked
with integrating all of the crap the 3rd party vendor wants. It's impossible
to object: the vendor is not going to rewrite all of their shitty scripts,
especially after the deal is already in place. Even when it's really bad,
arguing about it just results in endless meetings, conference calls and at
best the 3rd party vendor saying they'll think about putting some little tweak
in the backlog for some future release.

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thomasfoster96
Gee, sounds like maintains these sites is hell. It also sounds like a huge
opportunity if a startup could convince sites they need the fastest ads.

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pornel
Sorry, I didn't mean to paint such a bleak picture. There are good and smart
people working on these sites, and some newspapers have technically very good
code (apart from ads :)

There are also lots of very hard constraints. The publishing process is
complex and on strict schedules, especially if it's connected to printing of a
daily newspaper. There are hundreds of people involved, so upgrading CMS for a
newspaper is like changing wheels of a car while it's moving.

And on top of that monetization on the web is hard. Users hate paywalls.
Nobody wants a mobile app, especially not for overpriced in-app payments. But
something needs to bring money, and even getting ad inventory that's higher
class than "doctors hate this!!!" is also a very hard work.

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thomasfoster96
Well, I didn't mean to make it so bleak either, because some sites like the
New York Times have quite talented developers!

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bobajeff
"People often favor mobile apps because they are faster, cleanly formatted and
are constantly updated to take advantage of the evolving features of new
smartphones."

That's all conjecture. The truth is that the reasons people will use an App
over a website is subjective. Whatever reasons people have should be gathered
from research and studies and not just theories based off of a narrative from
site owners.

I still use the YouTube app but not the Twitter app. I prefer to use Google's
site over the widget/app but will sometimes on the spur of the moment.

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xbmcuser
My lament with Facebook has always been the corraling of the web into a
private network instead of the privacy that has stayed in the news. Apps for
different things has made things worse. Today rarely a new business open a
website they just post their details on Facebook or an app specific to the
industry. And we have to install an app or login to Facebook to access the
data. Google and twitter helping publishers might be good for publishers and
the open web but I dont think its enough to save it.

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ilaksh
Maybe they are talking about using the HTML AppCache/manifest and a script or
something that downloads all of the resources in the manifest and background-
preloads them in the Google/Facebook/Twitter etc. page/app. Maybe you don't
need a script, just a frame. Maybe a special 'article.html' resource or
something that is not allowed to have ads/popups/JS etc.

As long as they don't limit that to certain favored organizations.

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tdyen
Yeah, I'm not sure I trust Google so much anymore and I trust Facebook even
less. It'd have to be a W3 group somehow with all the players involved.
Definitely some of them would play spoiler like Microsoft did back in the day.
Apple would probably play spoiler with this, they like their App Store it
makes them money.

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CodingGuy
Kick the ads, analytics, visitor spy scripts out and you have a fast
website...

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organsnyder
And no revenue or analytics.

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seiji
You are not entitled to ad revenue or client-side analytics. The fact they
work at all is just an odd combination of historical missteps that will be
corrected in time.

That is, if we can ever get people to stop using Chrome. Chrome is Google's
Embrace, Extend, Extinguish. Release open browser, add features, then restrict
features like adding a default embedded "YouTube App" inside Chrome to get
around ad blockers. Add default "Google Apps" apps to make Google services
better than any other service you can use, because Chrome secretly loaded
native pre-cached client-side, not web, apps on your computer.

It turns out your default content consumption applications _shouldn 't_ be
written by corporations intertwined with advertising revenue.

It'll take the US government another 40 years to re-define monopoly scenarios
capable of handling current abuses of power. In the meantime, sit back and
enjoy the land grabs, rising stock prices, and shuttered startups who can't
compete with bundled platforms.

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sukii
We have to learn clever tricks to avoid these land mines. Get ourselves anti-
parasite injections etc...wise guys like you can help?

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hanlec
I assume this is the (counter) reaction to Facebook's instant articles. The
lack of details doesn't help though.

