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Google isn't the company that we should have handed the Web over to
Back in 2009, Google introduced SPDY, a proprietary replacement for HTTP that addressed what Google saw as certain performance issues with existing HTTP/1.1. Google wasn't exactly wrong in its assessments, but SPDY was something of a unilateral act, with Google responsible for the design and functionality. SPDY was adopted by other browsers and Web servers over the next few years, and Google's protocol became widespread.
[...] The same story is repeating with HTTP/3. In 2012, Google announced a new experimental protocol, QUIC, intended again to address performance issues with existing HTTP/1.1 and HTTP/2. Google deployed QUIC, and Chrome would use QUIC when communicating with Google properties. Again, QUIC became the basis for IETF's HTTP development, and HTTP/3 uses a derivative of QUIC that's modified from and incompatible with Google's initial work.
It's not just HTTP that Google has repeatedly worked to replace. Google AMP ("Accelerated Mobile Pages") is a cut-down HTML combined with Google-supplied JavaScript designed to make mobile Web content load faster. This year, Google said that it would try to build AMP with Web standards and introduced a new governance model that gave the project much wider industry oversight.
A person claiming to be a former Microsoft Edge developer has written about a tactic Google supposedly used to harm the competing browser's performance:
A person claiming to be a former Edge developer has today described one such action. For no obvious reason, Google changed YouTube to add a hidden, empty HTML element that overlaid each video. This element disabled Edge's fastest, most efficient hardware accelerated video decoding. It hurt Edge's battery-life performance and took it below Chrome's. The change didn't improve Chrome's performance and didn't appear to serve any real purpose; it just hurt Edge, allowing Google to claim that Chrome's battery life was actually superior to Edge's. Microsoft asked Google if the company could remove the element, to no avail.
The latest version of Edge addresses the YouTube issue and reinstated Edge's performance. But when the company talks of having to do extra work to ensure EdgeHTML is compatible with the Web, this is the kind of thing that Microsoft has been forced to do.
See also: Ex Edge developer blames Google tricks in part for move to Chromium
Related: HTTP/2 on its Way In, SPDY on its Way Out
Google Touts QUIC Protocol
Google Attempting to Standardize Features of Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP)
Google AMP Can Go To Hell
The Next Version of HTTP Won't be Using TCP
HTTP/3 Explained: A Work in Progress
Microsoft Reportedly Building a Chromium-Based Web Browser to Replace Edge, and "Windows Lite" OS
Mozilla CEO Warns Microsoft's Switch to Chromium Will Give More Control of the Web to Google
(Score: 5, Informative) by PiMuNu on Tuesday December 18 2018, @10:59AM (5 children)
Following recommendations off this site, I installed umatrix and was shocked at how pervasive google APIs are... I expect them in google obv, even places whose revenue comes from advertising (tumblr, etc). But they are *everywhere*. Even on corporate websites with nothing to do with google. Maybe 90 % of websites I visit call google APIs.
So their strategy is obviously working. It is impossible not to be spied on.
(Score: 4, Informative) by DannyB on Tuesday December 18 2018, @03:11PM
Their tragedy is working for most people.
Tip: Visit some web site. See another domain such as doubleclick that you would like to make red, or a domain that you might like to make green such as jquery.com. In uMatrix, click the asterisk directly to the right of the web site's domain name, at the top left of the uMatrix dropdown. Now mark certain domains as green or red. Then click the save button. Then re-click the domain name instead of the asterisk. Don't click the sub domain (abc.foobar.com) but the primary domain (foobar.com).
Now certain domains will be green or red on all websites you visit. There are some sites that I always want whitelisted, or blacklisted as I browse.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 18 2018, @06:31PM (1 child)
stop visiting sites run by scumbags.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday December 18 2018, @07:07PM
You can't say that!
Conservatives are already complaining that Google and the intarwebs are biased and don't give them enough traffic.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 3, Informative) by urza9814 on Tuesday December 18 2018, @06:33PM
Just add these to your firewall blocklist; that ought to get most of it:
https://api.hackertarget.com/hostsearch/?q=google.com [hackertarget.com]
Life without Google is pretty nice. Helps if you add some generic ad server lists too. Personally I also like to add the Bluetack level 1 and 2 lists (https://www.iblocklist.com), plus a few thousand additions that I've found myself. Mozilla's Lightbeam is a pretty nice tool for finding those; something like PrivacyBadger can help too.
It IS possible to get this crap off of your internet. Takes a bit of effort, but it's absolutely worth it.
The biggest problem I have though is with ReCaptcha being owned by Google. Makes it hard to login some places. But often there's another way in -- ie, with Sparkfun I can't login directly, but if I add stuff to my cart and go to checkout then I can login from the checkout without a captcha. Recaptcha is a mess anyway...half the time it doesn't load even when Google *isn't* blocked...
(Score: 2) by mr_mischief on Tuesday December 18 2018, @09:43PM
Many sites are using Google's Javascript code as part of their Google Analytics service as it's easier to let that call out to Google than to build comprehensive traffic analytics gathering for yourself. It's not necessarily nefarious on the part of the site, just expedient. They're already having Google index all those pages a particular way to get ranked where they want in search results and to get the cached data in Google's results freshened at proper intervals.
If Google is doing very sinister things with that data, someone needs to inform all the people providing it. They have reasons to do so, so they aren't going to suddenly stop for no reason.