technotarek

Edit: ...that Google shopping seems to ignore (!)

We're among those that believe there is room in the search space. We're building out our hyper local product search service city by city at https://attic.city. It's meant to fill the void with regard to smaller, non-chain stores that Google shopping seems to focus on.

Edit: Was thinking more of what self-implemented workflows/precessing tools one might consider (node packages etc) as opposed to paid SAAS options.

Cloudinary is nice, but it gets expensive really fast on a high traffic site that's image heavy and bandwidth optimized. For example, a single image might have 5-6 versions on top of the original -- low quality thumbnail, high quality thumbnail, default, default 2x retina, default 3x retina. Then activate their webp service and perhaps offer another image aspect ratio. Each is a conversion that counts against your quota. Now you've got 15+ (con)versions and you're shelling out hundreds of dollars a month.

I'm curious, how would the HN community tackle optimizing (and/or re- optimizing) ~200k images sitting in an S3 bucket?

If the browser only knew...but in many cases it doesn't, especially for a fluid width, responsive website. An image may have a near infinite number of potential dimensions depending on the user's viewport.

5% can still be a decent number of users, and tends to trend even higher in certain segments (state and local government, smaller "old economy" businesses)

Thx. Good to know. In that case, selective usage seems like good policy.

Except for the "works everywhere" suggestion...

https://caniuse.com/#feat=details

And here I thought Edge was a modern browser.

Wow, things have come a long way.

When CSS3 and jQuery first started gaining some traction (<8 years ago?), I tried a bunch of animations using layered images and image transformations. One of these "dreams" was of some hot air balloons as well. Desktop only:

https://technotarek.com/sky (first balloon appears at ~10s)

My favorite was a simple tail wag (https://technotarek.com/cat).

Edit: noted desktop only

Make it opt-in (vs opt-out)? As best I can tell, there is only the blacklist functionality (via a markup attribute). I can imagine many use cases where it would be far easier to only activate where a link has .instant-page.

Unless I missed it here or elsewhere, GA is the only option that integrates event tracking. That's really important, especially in js-powered UIs. I so want to ditch GA, but I so need (integrated) event tracking.

As much as I hate it, I suspect there is one answer with nearly perfect correlation as to why Pinterest is losing users and their engagement: Instagram.

No affiliation, just a happy user.

https://www.getpostman.com

Postman?

I'm curious, how did you generate your content for the spoof SERP page? Was it dynamic to somehow reflect the content of the user's original SERP page (which could be subject to the user's location, browsing history and other factors in G's algorithm)?

"When a smoke alarm goes off in a school or an office building, everybody stops what they’re doing and walks outside in an orderly fashion. Why? Because when smoke alarms go off (and there’s no drill scheduled), it frequently means there’s actual smoke somewhere."

Actually, I think it's because the potential consequences of ignoring a smoke alarm (vs a car alarm) are much more grave.

I first built ATTIC, which aggregated and indexed newly available products from local furniture stores in DC, to serve the personal needs of me and my wife. We were trying to furnish a new home using only locally bought goods, ideally vintage ones. I started with 15 or so stores to save us the time of having to go to each website one by one. It was pretty crude at first, but did the job. It saved us time and in some cases actually gave us an edge in seeing pieces that sell out quickly. Our home has come together well and almost entirely sourced from ATTIC. Mission accomplished.

Four years later it's now available in six cities and indexes hundreds of local independent stores.

https://attic.city

Another interesting story broken by Hersh: Vietnam's My Lai Massacre. Video interview at https://investigatingpower.org/vietnam-war/

Served by (evil) AMP!

Right. Or put another way, UX is the ultimate debate. So long as there is a significant difference, the debate has a winner.

Is there a reliable way to not bug users with the "add to home" prompt if they already have? The last implementations I saw were all underwhelming in this regard.

I'm a little younger than you, born after the war ended. In the 80s, there was a weekly dramatized series called Tour of Duty that ran for a bit on one of the networks. Paint it Black was the shows theme song. Anyways, I was too young to watch it critically or remember if it had a message to it. Does it ring any bells?

Also, I read your comment after suggesting a video in a separate comment below. You might like it. Re how the press uncovered the event.

https://investigatingpower.org/vietnam-war/

There's a good short video here with Seymour Hersh telling how he broke the story and brought it all to public attention:

https://investigatingpower.org/vietnam-war/

(Disclosure: We designed and developed the site.)

I really hope this is targeted at legacy sites. A well patterned and modern site developed in the past five years shouldn't have these issues.

Edit: The claim that Google ignores canonical refs should have a solid reference. I'm dubious but happy to be enlightened!

This question could be much wider in scope than AWS, so I'm surprised we don't have a wider variety of responses that touch upon everyday B2C ... bookstores (vs the original Amazon), shoe stores (vs zappos), home services (vs Amazon's task rabbit like service) etc. (Yes, I know this is hackernews!)

For my contribution, we're working on something where we expect AMZN to go far deeper into in the not so distant future: furniture. We're "safe" now because AMZN doesn't let you touch, feel and smell their offerings. That clearly could change if they continue to expand their physical retail footprint.

AMZN's impact on us: TBD. We think they may disappoint a lot of consumers. We focus on vintage and artisan furniture to cater to those that will want more variety and character.

https://attic.city

I will. You will. Just quit.

I can't help but think of the movie the Big Short. There's a large pool of social media marketers, influencers and other tangentially related businesses, all in some way propped up by this fake activity. They're not unlike all the hands that got involved in the mortgage business and securitizing of sub-par, high risk loans. If only there was a way to "short" the Instagram industry.

p.s. To those debating what constitutes a "fake" account, don't forget that the term was only recently invented: https://www.avclub.com/merriam-webster-points-out-that-trump...

Your point would have been even stronger had you provided said alternative source.

Armchair hypothesis: these careers are highly correlated to extro- and introversion. Introverts are content in their relationships and/or less frequently get themselves into situations that lead to divorce. Call it the nerd coefficient.