The throbber was the beginning of developers gaslighting users.
It began as an indicator during long loads that your system hadn't frozen (because whatever process was running had to update it), and became a useless animation that communicated nothing.
There’s at least one distinction I didn’t see in the article.
If a throbber is advanced by signals of progress or at least action, then it’s not useless and is arguably better than a progress bar that moves with unpredictable and uneven speed.
If a throbber is an animated gif displayed until something makes it go away, then it’s useless.
I have incredibly negative memories of the Netflix one, on cheap TVs with poor WiFi, which had a percentage which meant nothing.
It's used a lot in Android apps and it stresses me out on occasion when I'm in a rush.
Chromium on Android seems to use it well enough when reloading a page.
Often it feels like a jagged interruption in the application and like something is broken or out of place.
It began as an indicator during long loads that your system hadn't frozen (because whatever process was running had to update it), and became a useless animation that communicated nothing.
If a throbber is advanced by signals of progress or at least action, then it’s not useless and is arguably better than a progress bar that moves with unpredictable and uneven speed.
If a throbber is an animated gif displayed until something makes it go away, then it’s useless.