The Web can’t last for ever

Google and Twitter partner to create open Instant Articles.

Modern web pages are a woefully inefficient way to get an article from the internet to your screen. Modern web pages aren’t even pages, they’re whole applications. The article text is a tiny part of the total download.

Using the web to read articles is like downloading a new copy of Microsoft Word every time you want to read a document.

A web page can be simple and fast. But if you want responsive formatting, interaction, tracking and advertising, it won’t be. There’s nothing beautiful about 286 characters per line. On a large screen browser plain HTML is barely readable.

Instant Articles means all the presentation, tracking, and advertising stuff — the stuff that isn’t article content — lives on your phone. Only the content needs downloading every time you click a link.

It will make the Web faster for everyone. The downside? It moves power away from content publishers to the app creators. Google no longer gives you visitors — you give (or sell) Google/Twitter/Facebook content.

It’s a Google world, we just live in it.