Re: [w3ctag/design-reviews] Partial freezing of the User-Agent string (#467)

Significant time is now being spent by web engineers around the world "second guessing" how Google will proceed. In the interests of good governance and engineering @yoavweiss should now close this issue and the [associated Intent at Chromium.org](https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/forum/#!msg/blink-dev/-2JIRNMWJ7s/yHe4tQNLCgAJ) stating it will not be pursued. As many have pointed out the following is needed before it is ready to be debated by the W3C and TAG.

1. Define and agree the objectives.
2. Gather evidence to support the objectives - i.e. what is the impact on privacy in practice? How does this compare to other privacy weaknesses?
3. Produce a robust design to accepted standards compatible with dependencies and their timeframes i.e. privacy sandbox.
4. Articulate alternative designs that were considered and why they were rejected.
5. Understand the current use of the User-Agent and first request optimisations in practice.
6. Determine the effort impact of changing. The OpenRTB example provided by @ronancremin will consume hundreds of man years worth of engineering time across the AdTech industry alone. Any player that doesn't adopt the change will disadvantage the entire eco system. The vast majority of engineers are employed by Google's competitors who could otherwise be performing more value adding work. Google have no such constraints. The disruption benefits Google more than anyone else.

Related to this issue we have written to the Competition and Market Authority concerning Google's control over Chromium and web standards in general. A [copy of that letter is available on our website](https://51degrees.com/blog/response-to-online-platforms-and-digital-advertising-market-study).

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