I am providing critique here, the burden of proof is on whoever wrote the bold claim that application development is web development (speculation) and it is a better way of development (speculation).
> I am glad for you that you don't need them. But we'd like to at least have the choice.
I would not have a gripe with the article if it were the only thing it alluded to.
Innovation being actively blocked today, includes streaming games and other apps, cloud hosted apps, etc. And we will never know how much innovation is being blocked if there is always a gatekeeper.
This innovation freeze isn't just about "web" technology. It is blocking whole business models today.
And there is no reason "web" technologies, when free to improve, can't acheive parity or near parity with native apps in the future, with regard to performance, security, aesthetics, etc.
"Web" is just a historical starting place, not an impediment to future capabilities.
But as a counterpoint to the rest, web technologies have been free to achieve said parity on the desktop for a long time now. Have they? Do they provide _better_ experience for the user? or do they neglect the user whenever they can in return for _faster_ and _easier_ cross-platform development and ability to leverage existing web developers?
For instance we have PHP (easy to learn, but weak typing, arguably unclear design philosophy) on one end of the spectrum, and Rocket for Rust (which enforces memory discipline to provide highly reliable concurrency and high performance) at the other end.