In this case page load times are being valued over everything (not just AMP but also the search rankings algorithm).
I'm not 100% sure if it's a vanity metric for Google or not.
...Google does have some of the greatest statistical minds in the world, just maybe not the best product/UX minds.
KPI's can be highly misleading when it's disconnected from raw UX. It's difficult to measure user emotional experience, especially when you have a monopoly on user attention with Google Search and total product lock-in with Gmail. When users don't have alternative options analytics stats can be deceiving.
And just because a user completes X task a hundred milliseconds faster it doesn't necessarily mean the UX was better. And just because the UX was made incrementally worse doesn't mean I'm going to use Google/Gmail any less. But enough of small cuts can build up into a serious wound.
I'm not 100% sure if it's a vanity metric for Google or not.
...Google does have some of the greatest statistical minds in the world, just maybe not the best product/UX minds.
KPI's can be highly misleading when it's disconnected from raw UX. It's difficult to measure user emotional experience, especially when you have a monopoly on user attention with Google Search and total product lock-in with Gmail. When users don't have alternative options analytics stats can be deceiving.
And just because a user completes X task a hundred milliseconds faster it doesn't necessarily mean the UX was better. And just because the UX was made incrementally worse doesn't mean I'm going to use Google/Gmail any less. But enough of small cuts can build up into a serious wound.