Although I definitely agree that we need more competition in the Web to facilitate rapid advancements, I just feel bad for the web developers who would have to consider supporting all the different browsers (not just Chromium-based ones) if the monopoly were to end.
The horrors that is Webpack arose from the horrors that is the Web's philosophy of multi-browser and cross-platform backwards-compatibility. I wouldn't say that the philosophy is bad, but it sure does rile up a lot of web developers to support Internet Explorer.
We need to support most of browsers because if we’ll have one browser or technology, there will not more competition and moving forward. And monopoly is bad because of all our data stored in one company and there’s no privacy
Fair point, but then again, I pray for the poor souls who are on the receiving end of that competition.
Of course, this is not to say that I disagree with the competition. This is just some tough nut that I'm not really sure where to place myself in. It's quite a dilemma.
It is actually not so hard to support different browsers. You can use standard APIs that are managed by W3C and work across (almost) all browsers.
But if one browser or company has monopoly (which Google currently has), they can create their own APIs that works how they want and not how users or developers want. Sadly, developers have to adopt that new API even if it is not good or even throw away good old API because Google didn't like it (like that recent one about ad blocking).
Also, if you leave Chrome and then use another Chromium based browser, this wouldn't stop Google's monopoly. Even if Chromium is open source, it is still managed by Google so they can do whatever they want.
Do you live in a fantasy world? Are you being ironic?
My clients still request IE11 support... I must say that at least IE11 has easy fixes and an official test VM. Safari has none of those and is a hell to deal with. But that doesn't matter.
Monopoly in the browsers world has always been bad and this one might become the worst of all.
Also, Firefox and Chrome mostly agree on the features that they both implement so it's really easy to support both.
In a perfect world, diversity is definitely great! We have a bunch of standards committees that guide the many browsers towards a common interface and API for the Web. If all of these browsers comply with all (or at least most) of the standards at the same pace, then diversity will truly bring the best out of competition. Firefox and Chrome, as you said, are a great example of two competing browsers that implement standards at around the same pace, and thus introducing good competition.
Unfortunately, we don't live in such a world. Google is a monster of a company who has a bunch of resources that can easily stump and outpace the other smaller browser vendors in implementing web standards (in such a world with a diverse ecosystem of browsers).
My point is not to say that a monopoly is entirely good or entirely bad. I'm simply worried for the web developers and teams who might have a harder time to support a diverse ecosystem of (small) browsers that each implement web standards at a different pace.
But again, if pacing is not a problem, then I'm definitely all for diversity. Competition is always a good thing (from a user standpoint at least 😅).
Well I'm saying that unregulated monopoly is all bad and especially if the company holding it is as big as Google is.
Suppose that someone tells you that you can have as many chocolate cakes as you want as long as you keep your balls in their vice. But hey they promise not to squeeze! Would you do it?
Of course it would not be pleasant to be in such a situation as we are in right now. It just surprises me, given the "free" nature of the Web, Google is considering to add proprietary features and APIs. Something doesn't seem to be adding up.
But that's besides the point. I see now how my initial comment sounded as if I was "letting Google win for the sake of giving developers less work for browser support". I failed to properly communicate the true essence of my point wherein "too much diversity" is bad from a web developer standpoint.
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Although I definitely agree that we need more competition in the Web to facilitate rapid advancements, I just feel bad for the web developers who would have to consider supporting all the different browsers (not just Chromium-based ones) if the monopoly were to end.
The horrors that is Webpack arose from the horrors that is the Web's philosophy of multi-browser and cross-platform backwards-compatibility. I wouldn't say that the philosophy is bad, but it sure does rile up a lot of web developers to support Internet Explorer.
We need to support most of browsers because if we’ll have one browser or technology, there will not more competition and moving forward. And monopoly is bad because of all our data stored in one company and there’s no privacy
Fair point, but then again, I pray for the poor souls who are on the receiving end of that competition.
Of course, this is not to say that I disagree with the competition. This is just some tough nut that I'm not really sure where to place myself in. It's quite a dilemma.
It is actually not so hard to support different browsers. You can use standard APIs that are managed by W3C and work across (almost) all browsers.
But if one browser or company has monopoly (which Google currently has), they can create their own APIs that works how they want and not how users or developers want. Sadly, developers have to adopt that new API even if it is not good or even throw away good old API because Google didn't like it (like that recent one about ad blocking).
Also, if you leave Chrome and then use another Chromium based browser, this wouldn't stop Google's monopoly. Even if Chromium is open source, it is still managed by Google so they can do whatever they want.
Do you live in a fantasy world? Are you being ironic?
My clients still request IE11 support... I must say that at least IE11 has easy fixes and an official test VM. Safari has none of those and is a hell to deal with. But that doesn't matter.
Monopoly in the browsers world has always been bad and this one might become the worst of all.
Also, Firefox and Chrome mostly agree on the features that they both implement so it's really easy to support both.
In a perfect world, diversity is definitely great! We have a bunch of standards committees that guide the many browsers towards a common interface and API for the Web. If all of these browsers comply with all (or at least most) of the standards at the same pace, then diversity will truly bring the best out of competition. Firefox and Chrome, as you said, are a great example of two competing browsers that implement standards at around the same pace, and thus introducing good competition.
Unfortunately, we don't live in such a world. Google is a monster of a company who has a bunch of resources that can easily stump and outpace the other smaller browser vendors in implementing web standards (in such a world with a diverse ecosystem of browsers).
My point is not to say that a monopoly is entirely good or entirely bad. I'm simply worried for the web developers and teams who might have a harder time to support a diverse ecosystem of (small) browsers that each implement web standards at a different pace.
But again, if pacing is not a problem, then I'm definitely all for diversity. Competition is always a good thing (from a user standpoint at least 😅).
Well I'm saying that unregulated monopoly is all bad and especially if the company holding it is as big as Google is.
Suppose that someone tells you that you can have as many chocolate cakes as you want as long as you keep your balls in their vice. But hey they promise not to squeeze! Would you do it?
Abdicating on competition and letting Chrome win is exactly doing this. No later than last month Google announced that they would make some browser API paid.
Is that worthwhile to give so much power to Google in exchange of glitter down your throat just a few week in advance from the competition?
Ah, I apologize. I misunderstood earlier.
Of course it would not be pleasant to be in such a situation as we are in right now. It just surprises me, given the "free" nature of the Web, Google is considering to add proprietary features and APIs. Something doesn't seem to be adding up.
But that's besides the point. I see now how my initial comment sounded as if I was "letting Google win for the sake of giving developers less work for browser support". I failed to properly communicate the true essence of my point wherein "too much diversity" is bad from a web developer standpoint.