> My dream startup would be a Reddit-esque link aggregator, which favors the actual quality of submissions, instead of submissions which are lowest-common-denominator which are optimized for the hive mind.
On that note there's definitely a potential market opening, one sites like hackernews cater to.
I understand the need to fight obvious spam and shadowbanning being a good tool for that, but shadowbanning regular users that are trying to contribute actual content is very disrespectful to the users.
> Looks like the webkit prefix tags are creating the new IE6.
This bothers me. Webkit isn't some ancient browser that is has remained stagnant for years until google/apple decided to do something about it. Nobody spends hours debugging their perfect layouts in webkit. Webkit isn't holding the entire web back. It's just a poor comparison.
I browse mobile web in mostly firefox mobile, and I don't think I've ever seen a mobile site broken on FF but working on Chrome.
In fact at least Google has taken some steps to recitfy it, and they've stated they're putting experimental CSS properties behind developer flags. If we're talking about the fact that old people don't update old browsers then Microsoft is one to talk with IE7, IE8, IE9, and IE10.
Most of my professional time these days is spent on mobile/tablet websites for a major automobile manufacturer. And there are days when we absolutely do obsess over layout and other issues introduced by mobile safari itself. On the release of iOS 7, we actually probably burned a month working with a bug that we never found a solution to (which, fortunately, was fixed with iOS 7.1).
That last part underscores that we're fortunate browser makers are issuing regular updates (a big difference from IE). On the other hand, with some of those updates come new bugs and (particularly on Android) fragmentation. Consider that by 2006 there were enough people/resources documenting IE6's quirks that it was pretty rare to run across a bug that someone didn't have a good idea of how to fix/workaround. In 2014 when you run across a mobile bug (particularly one from a recent release, of which there are many), it may well be that nobody knows how to solve your problem, and in some cases nobody seems to even know how to tell you to duplicate it across devices/emulators (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/23142762/how-to-identify-... ).
And of course, like IE, many developers code webkit-only, even iOS only (and I know why: at the level of ambition people often have for mobile websites and with the difficulty involved in testing more than a few devices, it can sometimes seem like the only way to get things out the door).
IE6 was no picnic, but there are times I think to myself I'd rather be working on the 2006 desktop web than the 2014 mobile web....
I think you forget how bad it was with 2006 desktop. So many CSS hacks. We take our div layouts for granted but if you dared venture away from the standard table layouts of the early 2000s you were in for a lot of debugging for browser quirks.
Nowadays at least I code responsive layouts to target screen resolution, and its gotten leagues better. Sure there's a few quirks in separate browsers and things aren't necessarily ideal, but it sure beats the days of "I wish I could use xxxx CSS property but I can't because only 2% of my users would be able to render it".
The comparison is apt, just not entirely. It isn't a comparison of IE6 vs Webkit, it's of developer reactions to them.
For a long time, IE6 ruled the roost, so developers used IE6 as their development target. Browsers that moved beyond it, or implemented things differently (often correctly) were ignored.
On mobile, webkit rules the roost. Developers use it as their development target. Browsers that move beyond it or implement things differently (by using non-webkit prefixed CSS) are ignored.
I mentioned in another comment that when I think of IE6, I think of the hours spent fiddling with the HTML/CSS that works in FF/Chrome but not in IE6 because of browser bugs that were never fixed and standards not followed. It's why I think it's a bad comparison.
I guess it's a matter of perspective. My experience with IE6 was mostly being a teenage hobbyist webmaster way back when FF vs IE6 was in full spin - I remember being proud of coding standards compliant websites that worked perfectly in FF just to have it completely break in IE6, then having to spend hours fiddling with the HTML/CSS to get it to the point where it worked in IE6. Frustrating times.
That's why I don't really see the comparison. When I think of IE6 I think of the hours I wasted trying to make it work right. I'm not currently coding IE mobile websites, then checking it on a webkit browser, having everything be broken and then spending hours trying to fix it.
I enjoyed Digg and Reddit when they were interesting and had an intelligent set of comments/articles. In both cases they changed for the worse when the websites got more popular and attracted mainstream internet users, it's what drove me to HN. I wonder if it's just a matter of time before the same will happen here.
They've been trying for the last few years to copy apple's walled garden model when realistically their greatest strength was the fact that they weren't an overly restricted platform.
I'm not talking about Windows. Xbox is different. Xbox has always been a walled garden. The difference is that Xbox is a lot more exclusive than the app stores that everyone is now fond of.
Key to that notion of expression is that the signal sent MUST reflect the user's preference, not the choice of some vendor, institution, site, or network-imposed mechanism outside the user's control; this applies equally to both the general preference and exceptions. The basic principle is that a tracking preference expression is only transmitted when it reflects a deliberate choice by the user. In the absence of user choice, there is no tracking preference expressed.
By automatically setting DNT when a user hits express, they have not specifically indicated they do not wish to be tracked, therefore making the setting on IE meaningless, so companies will not honor the header. IE10 does not even expicitly tell you they're turning on the setting, they just do it for you when you hit "Recommended privacy settings" which is highlighted by a large green checkmark icon.
Just look at the disparity: http://www.futureofprivacy.org/2013/12/18/tracking-do-not-tr... Compared to users on browsers that do not push DNT like IE does, only about 7% of users enable the feature, tops. Then 10x as much users have it enabled on IE10, the browser typically used by the not-so tech savvy.
Unfortunately when the browser with one of the highest market shares does this, nobody tends to take do not track very seriously, especially tracking and advertising companies who will lose their competitive edge if they choose to not track half of their userbase. It doesn't matter what Microsoft's intentions were, but the end result is they made a mockery of the standard.
EDIT: fyi, several analytical and tracking software suites such as piwik automatically disregard the DNT setting on only IE10+, while respecting the ones on other browsers. This ironically makes IE the less privacy conscious browser.
>several analytical and tracking software suites such as piwik automatically disregard the DNT setting on only IE10+, while respecting the ones on other browsers. This ironically makes IE the less privacy conscious browser.
Similarly, by ignoring DNT Google and Co. just ensure that more people block their trackers and ads entirely.
I think the idea that the simplicity, lax compiler and readability of python will serve as a easier introduction to programming and keep more students from dropping out early. Java certainly has its place in enforcing verbosity, OO, coding standards, etc.
I think the mission here is to ease people into coding so if they don't want to progress any further up maybe they'll just manage a companies small PHP website or something and have the knowledge to do that.
I do hope this privacy conscious software becomes a trend and a race to the top. The amount of data collection is scary and the worse thing is the encouragement of sharing this information. I would like it even more if the data is encrypted to the point where not even the company has access to it... but with the cloud trends that doesn't seem like that's going to happen.
With the recent android updates to reduce importance of application permissions already has me urked, and I'm not a big fan of google now nagging me to enable search history. I'm considering to install a more privacy conscious ROM or put firefox OS soon on my phone.
It's not like they had much of a reputation with the tech savvy crowd to begin with, with their frivolous patent litigation and business practices. The kind of crowd that uses a service like no-ip is the kind of crowd that likely isn't a big microsoft customer.
The typical computer user will be ignorant to this and enterprise users don't care. The only way they'll really lose from this fiasco is if no-ip sues and wins in court.
On that note there's definitely a potential market opening, one sites like hackernews cater to.