Google Chrome To Begin Marking Sites That Are Slow / Fast

[starshipeleven]

At least on Firefox 70 it looks like it's using both. In about:config browser.safebrowsing.provider keys have both Google and Mozilla URLs.

Hm, it seems like that here too.

Dammit Mozilla!

EDIT: no wait a minute.

It seems this is a list-based system so Firefox is just downloading lists of bad sites from Google's repos, but the system is local, it does not send all your URLs over https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb...rotection-work

[starshipeleven]

Their blog post shows the warning on the loading screen of a site, not in Google search. And yes, I obviously forgot about safe browsing - my bad. Among the first things I deactivate whenever I set up a new browser or computer - even though I (maybe wrongly) have less qualms about Mozilla receiving my browsing data wrt. Google.

I can sort of see the justification for safety (though the quote on giving up liberties to gain safety comes to mind). Now sending my browsing data to Google so they can give me their opinion on the site I visit is another matter. But obviously this will be opt-in only, right?

Probably same as Safe Browsing, so opt-out.

Quite frankly, if you are running Noscript and ublock or other equivalents (uMatrix I think?) and you use the brain you don't really need that.

[Guest]

Use DuckDuckGo, taste the freedom.

I've been doing it for years already, and besides image search it's superior to Google in every possible way. I was talking about them using the fast page program to drive people away from sites with content they don't like regardless of how fast they are.

[starshipeleven]

Google Analytics can easily block the main js thread for ~150ms, which is a lot when you actually make a website that's fast.

My (X)doubt was about him noticing a 0.2 second delay, or the browser telling him that.

[starshipeleven]

I was talking about them using the fast page program to drive people away from sites with content they don't like regardless of how fast they are.

That's peanuts if compared to what they already accomplish by tailoring the search result to each individual. Doing Google searches from PCs of two different people show very different results (and world views) on many topics.

Google can already topple nations at the tip of a hat.

[JPFSanders]

Here we go again...

Google has reached plateau, just like MS did in the mid 2000's and they are starting to add anti-features because they do not know what to add next, don't know how to leave good enough alone, and are trying to anticipate your future needs. Usually "predicting" which is only a great idea on some guys head down in the bowels of the product and marketing department and makes corporations even more arrogant after their latest great idea is met with resistance or disdain.

If this "your website is slow" was a feature you could run from one of the web developer menus it wouldn't be so bad, however if they tell your customers around the world that your website is slow by displaying it on the URL for example, they are making you and your company look bad, period, they're ruining your reputation... for free.

If there is anything most people don't understand is "speed", it has to be one of the most ambiguous and subjective things ever to measure on a computer system, Ironically this entire website is built around this premise.

[kpedersen]

What about sites that are slow by design? i.e sites running from my home / consumer internet connection are not exactly going to be fast, and yet great for sharing software with colleagues.

This superficial gatekeeping from Google is fine, but it is not really "the internet".

[paupav]

gmail is probably the slowest website on the internet, I wonder if they will mark it as slow?

[JanW]

It seems this is a list-based system so Firefox is just downloading lists of bad sites from Google's repos, but the system is local, it does not send all your URLs over https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb...rotection-work

Reassuring. So Firefox only sends data about your browsing to Google if you either hit a site listed as dangerous (to double-check it has not been whitelisted recently), or if you want to protect downloaded executable files. I guess this works, because you can actually cover quite some ground with a database of malicious URLs of a size that can be reasonably download in the background.

Now if they want to show speed info or other ratings for a significant fraction of all sites, that database will need to remain on Google's servers, I guess, and lookup could not be performed locally.

[khnazile]

I got it: resources hosted on local network and accessible at 1Gbps, but over boring old HTTP/1.1 will be marked as "slow". And fancy new stuff using QUIC will be marked as "fast" even if you have 2Mbps uplink and 300+ ms latency.