I wonder why that is.
> This isn't always intentional, even.
I don't think everyone at Google is evil. There are many passionate engineers and hackers like you and me. However, if a Youtube developer has an issue with something running extraordinarily slowly, it's a much shorter call to the Chrome department than it would be to Apple's Safari or Mozilla's Firefox. So while developers might not be actively hindering other browsers, they are developing for Chrome. That it technically works on other browsers is a requirement but optimizing for the competition's browsers is not something I imagine management allocates hours for.
The end result is that they are hindering competition in the browser market, and quite a few people saw that coming. Still, even more people (vastly more people) either did not care or know and recommended Chrome anyway.
> Nobody is complaining their Android or iOS phone has DRM, do they?
My Android phone does not have DRM beyond what it in the SIM and I am complaining about people whose phones do. Many friends and peers share my view on this, so it's at least not "nobody".
https://developer.android.com/reference/android/drm/package-...
"Added in API level 11". Maybe you have a custom build with this ripped out, but then we're stretching by calling it "Android".
Then again, I'm not sure I have any apps that use this.
It's like they're trying to give up every advantage.
Youtube exists to sell ads, and a slow browsing experience on any device or browser does not serve that goal. So while Chrome may be their default testing environment, there's a very strong incentive to have it work well across the board.
As someone who has never used Chrome, I'd love to understand what exactly "works better" means. I've never had problems with any of those sites using Firefox and Safari.
Google broke YouTube for Firefox users right before the last Christmas holidays. Mozilla pushed out Firefox updates over the holidays that faked the UA as a workaround.
Google Inbox didn't work on Firefox initially, because Google claimed Firefox was too slow. When reported to Mozilla, it was fixed in a few hours, and they found that Chrome's implementation of the "thing that was too slow" was actually broken and not spec compliant.
Hangouts (used to?) require a plugin in Firefox, and just uses WebRTC in Chrome.
And so on...(sigh)
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1087963
Here's the Firefox bug report about Google Docs being 3-9% faster, in a particular performance benchmark, when Firefox spoofs the Chrome UA:
Google Hangouts uses WebRTC and NaCl without plugins in Chrome, but requires an NPAPI plugin or ActiveX Control (confusingly called the "Google Talk Plugin") in other browsers. Support for any browser other than Chrome is not listed on the Hangouts home page. You must search their KB to find the plugin installer.
Google can control both ends of the pipe, which means whenever they make big changes Chrome users will have a better experience. They pushed ahead there with MSE, codec support (VP9), SPDY, HTTP/2, etc and other browsers had to catch up. If other browsers were ahead in some areas, it didn't matter, because the content side didn't support it. Sites are designed and optimized in Chrome first and foremost, so Chrome never risks looking slow.
Similar things apply to Safari on iOS, or Edge on Windows.
The problem in my mind is that by having the same parties sit on both ends of this story, it's inevitable the middle man (that could be a leverage against DRM) gets pushed out. It's very, very hard to explain to the majority of users that they have to accept short term pain to avoid an outcome that is much worse for them. Ask any politician.
But we don't even need to kill the web to get there (pushing out any middlemen). We have native apps! Nobody is complaining their Android or iOS phone has DRM, do they?