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Palemoon drama has gotten bad


Wunderbar98

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1 minute ago, Mr.Scienceman2000 said:

Bit of sad story from online news and js. One local newspaper used to have site that allowed access everything with js disabled, had rss feeds and all other cool things. Then one day in earlier of 2021 I saw ad from their new beta site on newspaper and decided try it. It was horrible. It needed 4 addresses worth js (most were some cloud provider) to even render article and even then part of it was broken.

I sent feedback from new site using form (located on bloated MS cloud) that site did not work without javascript at all unlike previous site and explained why need for non js site would be required. I said for security I cannot allow that many domains of javascript and they should consider safety of customers/readers before implementing js enforcement and they should rework site.

Guess what? My reguest was totally ignored and two days later they pulled that horrible beta site to replace main one. They also killed all RSS feeds. I contacted them I wanted RSS back, if not public even as paid customer only and guess what? Went to blind ears again. All of articles are paywalled now and no way view properly with my configuration.

Few days forward they launched huge advertising campaign on our town to attract young hippy bleeding edge kids. Advertising pics had person with cell phone or tablet and said download mobile spyware I mean app that was basically electron wrapped website.

Then something strange happened and I started save amount of newspaper subscription per month, I no longer recieved newspaper and changed to alternatives.

I was not only who got mad about that and stopped paying from newspaper likely. They did show middle finger to all loyal customers and decided please hippies instead.

Replacing old customer base with new one that is easier cash grab with data mining, milking out from multiple subscribtions and other seems to be trend on companies in 2010 onwards

Yeah, said, it would be funny if it wasn't so prevalent anywhere. Microsoft, web browsers, newspapers, you name it, catering to the lowest of the low is the new thing now, anyone with sensibilities or common sense is now irrelevant and ignored.

No longer is it "know your customer and invent", it's "invent and find a customer, or make up one, if we have to".

The common denominator I see here is a move away from well-established standards and lightweight, fast, easy experiences towards bloated, proprietary, awful ones. Move away from/support for IRC, RSS, browser choice, Windows NT 6, plain text email support, not requiring JavaScript, etc... what do these all have in common?

Well for one, I'm going to try to run as fast as I can in the other direction :)

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I wouldn't call it tayloring to "hippies".

I'd call it survival of the fittest.

"Nobody" buys a "paper" anymore.

"Everybody" reads their news online or watches via TV.

If you cannot generate a revenue stream online then your industry is dead.

I myself haven't "read" a newspaper in THIRTY YEARS.

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28 minutes ago, ArcticFoxie said:

I wouldn't call it tayloring to "hippies".

I'd call it survival of the fittest.

"Nobody" buys a "paper" anymore.

"Everybody" reads their news online or watches via TV.

If you cannot generate a revenue stream online then your industry is dead.

I myself haven't "read" a newspaper in THIRTY YEARS.

I'm not sure that's entirely accurate. I still read the print paper, though often I'm in environments where I come by it for free, so I don't really pay for it ;)

I don't bother with online news at all. Anything important will be in the print newspaper. If it's not there, then it's probably not worth my time, OR I can go seek it out myself or will hear about it through email.

I'm not some old boomer, either, just a practical young guy that doesn't really fit the mold of the target all of these new age companies reinventing themselves for people who were born yesterday and have no attention span...

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4 hours ago, InterLinked said:

... So I think I'm going to be quitting Iron for good sooner or later, even if I don't necessarily want to.

I have also completely quit Iron and Vivaldi (even though they both still work) ... of course, as I'm running on XP, they are equal to Chrome 49 and this really isn't safe in 2021. I've uninstalled them and removed all traces and only use 360 now. I've come to like @ArcticFoxie 's build V12 and have not a single issue to complain. I haven't given up (yet) on Serpent (or FF52.9.1 for that matter) but I suspect, overtime, they will become less useful.

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9 hours ago, InterLinked said:

Yeah, said, it would be funny if it wasn't so prevalent anywhere. Microsoft, web browsers, newspapers, you name it, catering to the lowest of the low is the new thing now, anyone with sensibilities or common sense is now irrelevant and ignored.

No longer is it "know your customer and invent", it's "invent and find a customer, or make up one, if we have to".

The common denominator I see here is a move away from well-established standards and lightweight, fast, easy experiences towards bloated, proprietary, awful ones. Move away from/support for IRC, RSS, browser choice, Windows NT 6, plain text email support, not requiring JavaScript, etc... what do these all have in common?

Well for one, I'm going to try to run as fast as I can in the other direction :)

Luckily I can still control it for most parts. For email I use mailnews client and last time I logged into webmail was to enable IMAP support, news I read from teletext or rss, both are bloat free. For teletext I only need any TV with digital tuner or digital tuner with end device.

8 hours ago, InterLinked said:

I don't bother with online news at all. Anything important will be in the print newspaper. If it's not there, then it's probably not worth my time, OR I can go seek it out myself or will hear about it through email.

that is mostly true in my case. I like to use online news via RSS sometimes but mostly use newspaper and teletext. YLE teletext main page got anything important I need to know like emergency alerts or warnings if need "bleeding edge information"

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13 hours ago, InterLinked said:

I still read the print paper, though often I'm in environments where I come by it for free, so I don't really pay for it ;)

That's kind of a PROBLEM, don't you think?

An industry such as printed newspapers can't really survive if their only subscriber base are public libraries, airport cafes, and a restaurant here and there and none of their actual readers "really pay for it".

The industry PEAKED in 1973 with a small bump in 1984/1993 depending on weekly vs Sunday (by subscribers only, down by percent of population) and has been DYING ever since.

 

Total estimated circulation of US daily newspapers  --  https://www.pewresearch.org/journalism/fact-sheet/newspapers/

1973  --  63,147,000 weekly subscribers...  51,717,000 Sunday subscribers...

1984  --  63,340,000 weekly...  57,575,000  Sunday...

1993  --  59,812,000 weekly...  62,566,000 Sunday...

2011  --  44,421,000 weekly...  48,510,000 Sunday...

2012  --  43,433,000 weekly...  44,821,000 Sunday...

2013  --  40,712,000 weekly...  43,292,000 Sunday...

2014  --  40,420,000 weekly...  42,751,000 Sunday...

2015  --  37,711,860 weekly...  40,955,458 Sunday...

2016  --  34,657,199 weekly...  37,801,888 Sunday...

2017  --  30,948,419 weekly...  33,971,695 Sunday...

2018  --  28,554,137 weekly...  30,817,351 Sunday...

2019  --  25,952,584 weekly...  27,389,866 Sunday...

2020  --  24,299,333 weekly...  25,785,036 Sunday...

 

It really is a DYING and all but DEAD industry.

Factor in total US population and in 1973 there were 29.8% of 211.91 million total US population that subscribed to a weekly newspaper.

That number drops to 14.3% in 2011 with US population at 311.56 million.

And to 7.3% in 2020 at 330.66 million.

 

Like I said, the industry is DYING and if you really want to be able to pick up a newspaper and smudge your fingers with ink, you better hope they find some way to "survive".

And maybe, just maybe, you should consider that if you keep reading it for FREE then you won't have it in the future.

Edited by ArcticFoxie
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Somehow, someone needs to state this, to avoid possible misunderstandings.

Javascript in it self is not bad or evil.

It is the (terrible) use of it by incompetent or - worse - malicious web designers (and executives over them) that created the mess.

Besides (and this is a pet peeve of mine) it is some 15 years that I am told how "we have new technology X (or Y) that allows us to target advertisements, to show you relevant items".

Still it is 15 years that all I get is:

1) completely unrelated ads to my search terms
2) completely unrelated items to my navigation history
3) ads related to something I have ALREADY just bought (often on the same platform that processed the order, now, while something like toilet paper or soap may be something one re-buys often or periodically, I doubt that many people - like it happened last week to name an occasion - every day a wheel cart for transporting and lift demijohns (5 days of ads for similar wheel carts, 10 out of 10 at almost double the price I had paid )   or home Wi-Fi Range Extender[1]) 

jaclaz

 

[1] actually I needed a Access Point, but nowadays they are the same thingy that can be used for both AP and RE, then after I had bought a small piece pertaining to a (home) network, I (obviously) was in need of some related accessories (namely a couple Rj45 wall sockets and some spare RJ45 plugs) but waited before searching for them, just to see ifthe new smart technology was actually worth something, and obviously  for 3 (three) days all I had were ads for access points and not a single one about Rj45 plugs and sockets, not for anything else network or Wi-Fi related that was not an access point (I mean this smart technology might have thought I needed a switch or a router or an external antenna).

Edited by jaclaz
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1 minute ago, jaclaz said:

Somehow, someone needs to state this, to avoid possible misunderstandings.

Javascript in it self is not bad or evil.

It is the (terrible) use of it by incompetent or - worse - malicious web designers (and executives over them) that created the mess.

Besides (and this is a pet peeve of mine) it is some 15 years that I am told how "we have new technology X (or Y) that allows us to target advertisements, to show you relevant items".

Still it is 15 years that all I get is:

1) completely unrelated ads to my search terms
2) completely unrelated items to my navigation history
3) ads related to something I have ALREADY just bought (often on the same platform that processed the order, now, while something like toilet paper or soap may be something one re-buys often or periodically, I doubt that many people - like it happened last week to name an occasion - every day a wheel cart for transporting and lift demijohns or home Wi-Fi Range Extender[1]) 

 

 

[1] actually I needed a Access Point, but nowadays they are the same thingy that can be used for both AP and RE, then after I had bought a small piece pertaining to a (home) network, I (obviously) was looking from some needed paraphernalia 

Well, yeah, technically you're right. Problem is, JavaScript is like a drug to a lot of these "modern web devs". Once they start, they pump the page so full of JS that it seems like it's going to crash (or does).

I use JavaScript on my pages when it's necessary or highly, highly useful (for example, I do NOT even use it for form validation, I use HTML5 + server side). And most people would never notice it, because it's maybe a few lines, not a book chapter's worth.

I think I saw that a lot of sites are now more JavaScript than HTML, I still cannot literally fathom that, considering most of my pages (and I run *DYNAMIC WEBSITES*, mind you), have ZERO JS.

Would the world technically be a better place without JS? In theory, no, but in practice, I wonder... maybe...

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1 hour ago, jaclaz said:

Somehow, someone needs to state this, to avoid possible misunderstandings.

Javascript in it self is not bad or evil.

It is the (terrible) use of it by incompetent or - worse - malicious web designers (and executives over them) that created the mess.

perhaps I worded it bit too roughly. My issue with javascript is that atleast newer one does not have so strict limits what it can do to please developers and that is making it unauthorised code executed on cpu in my point of view. Webassembly which is javascript makes it even worse and upcoming webgpu well time will tell.

 

Also javascript is not standard at all. Google and Microsoft keep creating their own code with it causing major headache to someone who does not want bleeding edge browser all the time rather prefer long term support. Atleast flash and java had standardised plugins and dynamic contect was able to work on firefox or opera and not just internet exploiter back in day. Sure those had vurneabilities, but so does webassembly and js. Anytime web browser runs unauthorised code you risk machine to those vurneabilities

One of js abuse is ability to read your nic mac address which can be used for fingerprinting in future or deanonymise TOR users unless they use mac address randomisation.

 

Question is one point activex fell out of use in favor of Javascript and everyone look how stupid idea it was to give web browser that much power. And even today some suffer from it consuquences. Enterprise environments still got tools made with active x that cannot be dropped out of use since nobody full knows how it works since person who coded it left place long ago. Vendor lock in. So how bad side effect will be once JS issues gets addressed?

1 hour ago, InterLinked said:

 

Would the world technically be a better place without JS? In theory, no, but in practice, I wonder... maybe...

Yes if coders would be required use something actually optimised and not just wrap js bloated webpage to electron and call it program. I have been studying C for last few years. It is very complex, but can write very efficent code.

 

I am tired of Microsoft teams used to communicate with workmates sucking 2gb of ram, when basic function is exactly same as older messaging softwares with too much fluff

 

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The simple and concise version:  I hate the modern Internet. 

The long version:

Just about every imaginable aspect of it seems to demand infinite RAM and CPU cycles, and for what?  To do the EXACT same things websites did 20 years ago (via Flash and, yes, ActiveX)?!  And these sites managed to do what they did at about the same speeds sites do them now, with 1/10th the available resources! (the average PC in 2001 had probably 256 MB of RAM and 20 or so GB of disk storage, which is nothing by modern standards).

And Google?  It seems to me they're leveraging their immense size and reach to remake the Internet in their image (proprietary and exclusionary), simply because they can.  And they pass it off as an improvement??

And don't even get me started about Facebook, one of the other major evils of the Internet industry... *grumble*

What would be nice is if someone created a new browser, which incorporates a sensible, standard UI (something PM-like would be nice, but FF 5x.x would be okay too) and a light weight, efficient rendering engine which is highly compatible with Chrome where needed, but completely open with as little telemetry as possible (undoubtedly, there will be sites that require telemetry as a "feature," so this hypothetical browser would have to "emulate" enough of it to keep the site happy, but without the security risks).

This browser should be cross-platform, and it should be backwards compatible as far back as reasonably possible by using basic APIs and simple runtimes wherever possible (think Mac OS back to 10.6 and Windows to at least XP SP2, but ideally XP RTM and 2000).

If anyone wants to start this project, count me in as one of your first customers!!

c

Edited by cc333
Whew! What a post!!
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1 hour ago, cc333 said:

The simple and concise version:  I hate the modern Internet. 

The long version:

Just about every imaginable aspect of it seems to demand infinite RAM and CPU cycles, and for what?  To do the EXACT same things websites did 20 years ago (via Flash and, yes, ActiveX)?!  And these sites managed to do what they did at about the same speeds sites do them now, with 1/10th the available resources! (the average PC in 2001 had probably 256 MB of RAM and 20 or so GB of disk storage, which is nothing by modern standards).

And Google?  It seems to me they're leveraging their immense size and reach to remake the Internet in their image (proprietary and exclusionary), simply because they can.  And they pass it off as an improvement??

There simple reason. Back in day devs were not able to get away for making horribly optimised code so easily (internet exploiter is expection). Back then RAM and hdd space was relatively pricey and internet access was over modems for most. Broadband access was new and it purpose was not download bloated page rather have faster speed for stuff like download/stream music and video.

 

Making site load slowly like today if wont have bleeding edge connection was saying "f**k you I do not want to do business with you.". Today normies got fast enough connection to make it possible push unoptimised junk acceptable with "most users got good connection" excuse.

Sure I do have 100mb/s cable modem connection but only because apartment offered 10 euros per month. I took it to have better connectivity to server and file transfer use. And most sites download relatively quickly. BUT that does not make accept bloated contect. I am lucky  to enjoy such luxury, but not all does have that. Pretty sure many on this board have even capped data connection and speeds way below that.

 

Most modern sites look flat and ugly and got useless stuff like text done with js, hamburger menus etc. everywhere. Back in day dynamic web pages did something cool actually and were not just to track you.

Making static site is impossible unless using web tools unless use something like old Dreamweaver or do all HTML with text editor since they all are just web frameworks now.

 

Best way to classic internet is to do simple personal site and use XHTML since that is much more strict and actually standard. I currently do not have website but somepoint will setup one when got time though I wonder how long it takes until my domain is suspended or site ddosed for stating opinions from these problems and someone found it went to reddit or twatter causing outrage among fanboys (yes I hate those services).

 

1 hour ago, cc333 said:

And don't even get me started about Facebook, one of the other major evils of the Internet industry... *grumble*

What would be nice is if someone created a new browser, which incorporates a sensible, standard UI (something PM-like would be nice, but FF 5x.x would be okay too) and a light weight, efficient rendering engine which is highly compatible with Chrome where needed, but completely open with as little telemetry as possible (undoubtedly, there will be sites that require telemetry as a "feature," so this hypothetical browser would have to "emulate" enough of it to keep the site happy, but without the security risks).

This browser should be cross-platform, and it should be backwards compatible as far back as reasonably possible by using basic APIs and simple runtimes wherever possible (think Mac OS back to 10.6 and Windows to at least XP SP2, but ideally XP RTM and 2000

That is huge thing to do considering chromium changes all the time more bloated and you would have to rewrite all code more efficent while keeping all those broken standards.

 

I would want web browser that purpose is to download documents over network and render them onto your screen and not some application platform. Palememe is closest to it along with retrozilla and netsurf

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2 hours ago, Mr.Scienceman2000 said:

There simple reason. Back in day devs were not able to get away for making horribly optimised code so easily (internet exploiter is expection). Back then RAM and hdd space was relatively pricey and internet access was over modems for most. Broadband access was new and it purpose was not download bloated page rather have faster speed for stuff like download/stream music and video.

 

Making site load slowly like today if wont have bleeding edge connection was saying "f**k you I do not want to do business with you.". Today normies got fast enough connection to make it possible push unoptimised junk acceptable with "most users got good connection" excuse.

Sure I do have 100mb/s cable modem connection but only because apartment offered 10 euros per month. I took it to have better connectivity to server and file transfer use. And most sites download relatively quickly. BUT that does not make accept bloated contect. I am lucky  to enjoy such luxury, but not all does have that. Pretty sure many on this board have even capped data connection and speeds way below that.

 

Case in point: I have a colleague who lives in rural California. AT&T wants to party like it's 1999, literally. Even though it's 99.9999% certain they have room on their DSLAM, they refuse to give him DSL. So dial-up is his only option. 56kbps is totally unusable on the modern web. I helped out a bit by setting up a plain text proxy, where you put in a URL and it spits out the page in plain text. That can significantly cut down on the page load time since it's not sending all the bloated JS for the page, images, all the other garbage, just the actual plain text that renders on the page.

 

Right now, he is paying hundreds of dollars per month for 8 (EIGHT) POTS landlines. 1 for his main voice line, and 7 for dial-up Internet. Using PPP multilink on another person's private dial-up server, he can get about 350kbps in the most ideal circumstances. That's it. It's "high speed dial up" but it still sucks on the modern web.

 

This is outrageous, especially these days. I think if a site doesn't load gracefully on 56kbps, then it fails the "accessibility test". Many, maybe most, people may have broadband, but many do not. Many are on dial-up, or slow DSL because they are too far away from the CO.

 

2 hours ago, Mr.Scienceman2000 said:

Most modern sites look flat and ugly and got useless stuff like text done with js, hamburger menus etc. everywhere. Back in day dynamic web pages did something cool actually and were not just to track you.

Making static site is impossible unless using web tools unless use something like old Dreamweaver or do all HTML with text editor since they all are just web frameworks now.

Well, static HTML is easy, and I do all my programming by hand, but yeah, "nobody" does real web dev anymore apparently, it's frameworks or WYSIWYG stuff.

2 hours ago, Mr.Scienceman2000 said:

Best way to classic internet is to do simple personal site and use XHTML since that is much more strict and actually standard. I currently do not have website but somepoint will setup one when got time though I wonder how long it takes until my domain is suspended or site ddosed for stating opinions from these problems and someone found it went to reddit or twatter causing outrage among fanboys (yes I hate those services).

 

That is huge thing to do considering chromium changes all the time more bloated and you would have to rewrite all code more efficent while keeping all those broken standards.

 

I would want web browser that purpose is to download documents over network and render them onto your screen and not some application platform. Palememe is closest to it along with retrozilla and netsurf

 

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7 hours ago, Mr.Scienceman2000 said:

That is huge thing to do considering chromium changes all the time more bloated and you would have to rewrite all code more efficent while keeping all those broken standards.

True.  It's definitely a nontrivial undertaking, but I really hope someone somewhere decides to do it, because the current state of affairs is stupid. 

I have a newish Skylake-based PC, and even that is struggling with the stupid internet.  On an 800Mbps connection, no less!!

And I was kindly updated to Firefox 91 ESR the other night, and you know what?  Even though it did seem a bit faster, the new UI is ugly, and it partially broke all the userChrome cusomizations I'd made (out of fairness, though, it actually still renders it, which gives some hope).

I was tired, so I went back to 78 ESR and hardcoded it to disable updates altogether, so I don't get updated (or even notified) again until I'm good and ready.

c

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This is becoming more frustrating every day.

Up until a few weeks ago, I had pretty much no compatibility issues in either Iron 70 or New Moon.

Now, a lot of things don't work in any of the 3 browsers I have: Internet Explorer, Iron 70, and New Moon 28.

I was very displeased this morning to find that Wordpress.com is among these sites now. When you click "Log in", you just see the Wordpress logo. IN ALL THREE BROWSERS!

Of course, it works in a modern version of Chrome, but WTF? This is not "web accessibility" or "standards compliant". Why is it that I suddenly see dozens of JS errors in the F12 console now? Why keep reinventing the wheel to break existing browsers while adding literally nothing? This used to work, this is nothing more or less than a regression.

I'm a web developer, of course, so I don't need wordpress.com, I only keep it for one site that is mostly links and easier to just add a quick link that way, and I don't have a domain for it so the free .wordpress.com was fine. But now that I cannot edit this site anymore, looks like Wordpress has left me no choice but do the site on my own and jump ship from Wordpress.

Is there any way that this might NOT have been an intentional regression? I can't see why not, but it seems puzzling that all of a sudden lots of sites are suddenly having compatibility issues in the past few weeks.

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So totally agree!

For me it was 14 months ago so you lasted longer than I did.

I found myself needing FOUR web browsers in order to access bank accounts, visit online research sites, access work archives, et cetera.

It was actually quite exhilarating to CANCEL a credit card and when asked "why" I told them that they will never control what web browser and operating system I use on my own computer.

I was always very happy with Mypal 27 and 28 and New Moon 27 and 28.  I have "fairly" modern hardware so I 'could' have used much newer browsers, but there were reasons I used what I used.

I was actually quite reluctant to turn to Chromium-based (despite one of those previously mentioned four being Chromium v49) as my default browser.

But it really became excruciating to have to remember which of FOUR (three after cancelling one of my credit cards) was best for this, best for that.

I've been very happy with 360Chrome despite my very long reluctance to turn away from Mypal and New Moon.

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