And standards sorts both of those out.

( Naive Amoeba Bored Cig, Sat 4 Mar 2006, 23:40, archived)

I dare you to rewrite the Google home page
in standards compliant XHTML + CSS and make it smaller than what they have there.

When you're pushing hundreds of terabytes of data a day, every byte counts, and non-standards compliance can be forgiven.
(casiotone (multiple personality disorder version), Sat 4 Mar 2006, 23:44, archived)

It could be easily changed
The google code is awful. It (their design) is so simple though, as well.

It can't be forgiven when it comes to a huge site that people with poor eyesite frequent. Screen readers' compliance and all that?
( Naive Amoeba Bored Cig, Sat 4 Mar 2006, 23:49, archived)

Screen readers learned to cope with the web
long before standards compliance was the in thing. I'm sure Google are concerned and are putting just enough in to make the website work on as many browsers in as many situations as possible, but that doesn't mean they have to make it perfect.

I'm not saying standards compliance is bad of course. I support it, but there's always exceptions, and high bandwidth sites are one of them.
(casiotone (multiple personality disorder version), Sat 4 Mar 2006, 23:53, archived)