alt Hacker NewsObjections to Gemini that point out that nothing is stopping people from writing simple HTML miss the point.
It's not that HTML forces well-meaning creators to add complexity, size, or user-hostile behavior; it's that an ecosystem that permits such behavior eventually becomes swamped by adtech and other user-hostile content for financial gain. The problem is that this content drowns out organic, human-centric content.
Having said that, while format restrictions (to plaintext, markdown, gemtext, HTML without JavaScript) do help mitigate the damage somewhat by making tracking harder, I doubt they are sufficient: even text-only forums can become overrun with spam, ads, bots, and propaganda if they lack suitable moderation.
Ultimately folks who want to browse a web of authentic human content need to combine format restrictions with blocklists and web-of-trust tools. Browser plugins, reader mode, and customized search engines can already get us partway there, but there are still gaps.
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This point gets missed by a lot of people.
You could theoretically have a web that does not bloat. HTML is a very good technology for building clean documents. You are not going to get that, though. What happens instead is that you start on a thoughtfully designed page and are always one click away from a cookie consent banner on top of an email capture modal beside four flavors of ad. "Sure, but you can install adblock/VPN/Pi-hole/reader mode/turn off JS/etc/etc..."
I like Gemini because it actually delivered a lightweight protocol that provides what I was looking for. Additionally, it is not just a technology. It is an ecosystem that gained more traction than the hundreds of other attempts that never went anywhere.
The spec made mistakes, but HTTP has mistakes too.
Thats a big assumption. As Michael Goldhaber put it in the early days of the Internet - people have limited capacity to give Attention to anything but unlimited capacity to receive Attention. Scientists and technologists are not immune. And it shows up in what they cook up.
It's a good point, but I think the counter is that if the only people writing anything available via Gemini would have written nice simple HTML anyway, then not an awful lot is gained.