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by bdarnell 2518 days ago
Don't destroy it, embrace it. AMP is the low-javascript web many of us pine for. If browsers implemented AMP natively (and it were properly standardized), it would be great, and it has tons of potential for things like RSS readers. Google's heavy-handedness here has a lot of problems, but if they've managed to get publishers on board with a move away from the JS quagmire we should be pushing in the same direction and not fighting against it.
2 comments

AMP still includes javascript that does many retarded things, including hiding the site contents until the JS is loaded, often from 3rd party CDNs. So if you're blocking the amp JS then the site just shows a blank screen, until some CSS animation trickery blends it in a few seconds later.

In other words if you use a content blocker AMP can be slower than the page would be without it.

AMP hides the entire page to avoid what is known as a Flash of Unstyled Content (FOUC). The document unhides as soon as a single AMP javascript resource loads, or an 8s timeout if that fails. That javascript is very cacheable and is often already in the browser cache to begin with.
The page is also readable without that script and browser engines already delay the initial paint. So this is entirely unnecessary.
embrace something else. It would be lovely if it was implemented natively, disentangled from google, and without google strongarming websites to their own implementation and CDN.

They didnt win publishers because of their wonderful implementation, they are literally blackmailing them with deranking if they don't (I suppose I could use a carrot analogy but i m more suspicious)

There is so much evil that can happen if AMP becomes the de facto walled garden of the web. I imagine if that happens, then we 'll end up needing google's review before websites can even be reachable. Or a government could order google to effectively shut down a bunch of sites instantly. The current version of amp is worthy of destruction before it grows to become indestructible