The average webpage is now the size of the original doom

[profeet]

​

The web is Doomed.

Today the average webpage is about the same size, data-wise, as the classic computer game Doom, according to software engineer Ronan Cremin.

A compressed copy of the installer for the shareware version of Doom takes up about 2.39MB of space. Today’s average webpage, meanwhile, requires users to download about 2.3MB worth of data, according to HTTP Archive, a site that tracks website performance and the technologies they use.

That’s not totally analogous comparison, but it does illustrate the web’s growing obesity problem. “Recall that Doom is a multi-level first person shooter that ships with an advanced 3D rendering engine and multiple levels, each comprised of maps, sprites, and sound effects,” Cremin writes on MobiForge, a site for mobile web developers. “By comparison, 2016’s web struggles to deli...

http://www.wired.com/2016/04/average-webpage-now-size-original-doom/






+BusinessTech skillz

 

[[)roi(]]

Fonts, Adverts, Trackers, ... so much crap that adds nothing to the experience.

 

[rward]

Fonts, Adverts, Trackers, ... so much crap that adds nothing to the experience.

I agree with Adverts and Trackers to follow you around and build up a profile.

I think analytics are good, they give you insight into what you have built.

Fonts I feel are quite important and provide a great improvement to the web.
I feel that having a good font can make or break a site and also improve readibility.

Images are also tricky. Monitors are 1600px x 1200px these days and trying to optimize a full screen image is a bit harder than back when we had 800px x 600px max.

 

[[)roi(]]

I agree with Adverts and Trackers to follow you around and build up a profile.

I think analytics are good, they give you insight into what you have built.

Only for you, but it does nothing for the user.

Fonts I feel are quite important and provide a great improvement to the web.
I feel that having a good font can make or break a site and also improve readibility.

Rubbish, standard OS fonts are more than ample + plus not every "designer" has good taste.

Images are also tricky. Monitors are 1600px x 1200px these days and trying to optimize a full screen image is a bit harder than back when we had 800px x 600px max.

No problem with images in general, with the exception of tons of image ads.

Granted there are some sites that consider their users by trying to maintain a good balance between ads, content and plugins -- but that's more the exception rather than a rule. for example:

• washingtonpost.com is one of the worst, just visiting their site (without any blockers) ends up downloading ~60mb and that's even before you click on an article. Turn on ad / tracker blocking, and it is reduced to ~2.5mb, drop the fonts, and it's close to ~1mb

Here's a comment from a washingtonpost executive:

“We have very little control over ads that load late or slowly, but we wanted to make the core use experience as solid as possible. That’s what we have control over,”

Are some innocent site being unfortunately punished? Sure they are!, but we didn't get to this point because of unreasonable users, but rather because of greedy content providers. Pay walls are not the answer either, not everyone (including me) wants to have tons of micro payments coming off my account. FFS think of the time wasted to maintain crap like that.

For now thankfully there's plugins to remove all the rubbish that either some greedy executive wanted or some "design" idiot thought users would like.

FFS how much of my CPU, bandwidth is wasted for this crap... yet when I block it the site executives now want to erect paywalls -- never did they consider paying me for wasted CPU time and bandwidth use.

 

[Cray]

Sites with auto-playing video ads....

 

[Progenix Oj101]

The first Doom was 2D though, not 3D.

 

[HeftyCrab]

Sites with auto-playing video ads....

The worst.

 

[xumwun]

The first Doom was 2D though, not 3D.

More like a fake 3D

 

[flippakitten]

We've gone from a 14.4k Dial-up to 100mbps+ in that same time frame, our laptops have become what was considered a super computer back then. I used joke about "one day I am going to get a machine that has 1gb of ram and 10gb hard drive", like it was impossible. So yeah, it's grown in comparison to the industry.

Anyway, I agree with the issue on too many ads and trackers but I really don't mind if a site has an ad or two on it. (MyBB is a great example of too many. Viewing it without adblocker it's a christmas tree.)

My main hate (apart from autoplay videos) is when people try to monazite absolutely nothing instead of offering a good service and I am not in the habit of paying for nothing (except for tax in South Africa), so a paywall is just going to send me somewhere else.

 

[giggity]

Rubbish, standard OS fonts are more than ample + plus not every "designer" has good taste.

A majority of the default Windows fonts are worthy of permanent deletion. There are a few, like Arial, which are pretty good, but others are lacking.

My solution would be to include a large library of common webfonts (rather than all those awful fonts nobody ever uses in) operating systems. It would only take up a hundred megabytes and end up saving a decent amount of bandwidth over time. It would also provide better fonts for people to use by default, aiding in pushing them away from Comic Sans.

 

[[)roi(]]

MyBB is a great example of too many. Viewing it without adblocker it's a christmas tree.

I agree, for that reason I no longer bother to visit MyBB homepage; shortcut to forums -- problem solved.

 

[[)roi(]]

A majority of the default Windows fonts are worthy of permanent deletion. There are a few, like Arial, which are pretty good, but others are lacking.

My solution would be to include a large library of common webfonts (rather than all those awful fonts nobody ever uses in) operating systems. It would only take up a hundred megabytes and end up saving a decent amount of bandwidth over time. It would also provide better fonts for people to use by default, aiding in pushing them away from Comic Sans.

That's the case with any OS -- still there are more than enough good one's that I shouldn't have to pay a download penalty each time I visit a site.

 

[rward]

Only for you, but it does nothing for the user.

Done properly, analytics can help refine a site, removing cruft and crap and leaving the user with a better experience.

Rubbish, standard OS fonts are more than ample

hahahahaha - How many of the fonts are cross platform?
http://www.cssfontstack.com/ - I find 8 (Arial, Arial black, Verdana, Trebucher MS, Tahoma, Georgia, Times New Roman, Courier New) and they don't have *nix compatability.

So, if you like your sex missionary and your car in black or black then I guess those do suffice ...


I fully agree that Ad providers should be shot out into orbit!

 

[[)roi(]]

Done properly, analytics can help refine a site, removing cruft and crap and leaving the user with a better experience.

Value for a site, maybe... as to value for the user. I'd rather have the CPU cycles and faster page load times. Analytics IMO should belong on the server sucking up their CPU cycles..

hahahahaha - How many of the fonts are cross platform?
http://www.cssfontstack.com/ - I find 8 (Arial, Arial black, Verdana, Trebucher MS, Tahoma, Georgia, Times New Roman, Courier New) and they don't have *nix compatability.

So, if you like your sex missionary and your car in black or black then I guess those do suffice ...

I fully agree that Ad providers should be shot out into orbit!

Sure... but then all platforms have their defaults and similar fonts; so cross platform is easily accommodated in CSS using standard fonts. Either way I block all fonts; speed is far more important to me than some web "designer's" opinion of what constitutes good design.

Ps... no need to get personal....

 

[Progenix Oj101]

The first Doom was 2D though, not 3D.

Call it what you want, but it was 100 % a 2D engine.

 

[giggity]

In my mind, web browsers should have APIs which replace common functionality on sites. Rather than loading jQuery and Google Analytics for every second site on the web, it should be built into web browsers and optimised as far as possible.
Less bandwidth needed for the user and server, less requests on load, less CPU cycles because of direct implementation of libraries into browsers' technology. It could also entail less security risks.

 

[profeet]

In my mind, web browsers should have APIs which replace common functionality on sites. Rather than loading jQuery and Google Analytics for every second site on the web, it should be built into web browsers and optimised as far as possible.
Less bandwidth needed for the user and server, less requests on load, less CPU cycles because of direct implementation of libraries into browsers' technology. It could also entail less security risks.

Not a bad idea, however what would you suggest for backwards compatibility?

 

[Chevron]

Only for you, but it does nothing for the user.

This is incorrect.

Analytics let's you know what's working, and what's not working for your users so you can deliver a better experience.

 

[giggity]

Not a bad idea, however what would you suggest for backwards compatibility?

The browser could find any script tags with a certain property value. So the script tag could look like this:

<script src="jquery.js" library="jquery" version="^3.0.0"></script>

or something. Versioning would work like npm package.json files.

If the browser doesn't support the feature, it will just load the script as a fallback.

 

[[)roi(]]

This is incorrect.

Analytics let's you know what's working, and what's not working for your users so you can deliver a better experience.

Again confusion with the analytics sales pitch vs. reality...

It consistently sucks up CPU cycles, sucks up bandwidth, slows my page loads and you want me to assume the site is going to use this data to provide better content. Rubbish there is no guaranteed correlation between the pain and better user experience. i.e. you are guaranteed to consistently mess with my CPU, bandwidth and page load speeds, but I have no absolute guarantee your service will be better.

Show me an example where there is tight correlation between the two i.e. which services were crap until it employed analytics, and which service wouldn't have improved without analytics. Basically prove the correlation.

Plus am I to assume that because many users are blocking adverts, trackers and analytics that the services are going to immediately become crap? i.e. creativity cannot occur in the absence of analytics and trackers?