kleinbl00:

So... there are a lot of allegations in here that aren't really backed up by evidence. My primary objection is that even should everything this guy (who is he?) comes to pass, "the browser" will remain the Latin to the Internet's Dark Ages, a Lingua Franca to patch all the holes left by the balkanization of the "online" experience. Consider:

- Help files are now and likely always will be simple pointers to HTML code that can be updated by the vendor. Regardless of "apps" that run on iOS, Android, Linux, OS X, Symbian, Cobol or Turbo Pascal, some universal, simple, plain-text-readable repository of information will serve as the "help file" for that service on any device it runs and it's simply too easy to write it once than to write it a million times. Consider: we're now using markup that can encode video, but anything you download comes with either a .txt or .pdf.

- the Internet is just another app. Regardless of what sorts of wonders you have on your device, the rest of the world is still out there. I don't have a crapload of apps on my phone, but of the apps I have, fully 40% of them have web browsers built in. It's system level, and it's free, and it allows them to plug the holes, as mentioned above.

- Kids break rules. Rebellion is in the DNA of every person who ever walked the earth and for every locked door there's a person wondering what's behind it. Unless your purpose is to completely cut a person off from "the Internet" they will circumvent whatever safe walls you build just because you've built them.

- The larger services are just APIs. My address book speaks Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. G+ is a layer that Google sprinkles on top of the entire internet. "Sign in with Facebook" is the kudzu of the new decade. What were destinations are now building blocks that any developer or writer can plug into his content. Comply with Facebook's TOS and you're in Facebook's ecosystem. The road's still there even if AMC is no longer making cars; "the Internet" remains a collective of mutual compatibility no matter what form you choose to navigate it with.

- Laptops suck for browsing. Tablets suck for typing. I don't care how dead "the internet" is; you're still going to have to write a paper about Sitting Bull in 9th grade. Tell me the difference between a tablet with a bluetooth keyboard and trackball attached and a laptop - other than the OS. It's the same as browsing the Internet through Safari or browsing the Internet through 1Password - it's still a Quartz engine.

It all strikes me as myopic ("Whatsapp has won messaging, text and instant" - ORLY) and overly sensationalist. Yeah, we interact with the Internet differently on a touchscreen tablet OS than we do on the desktop. We interect with the Internet differently through a Roku or XB360 than we do through a tablet. It's still the Internet.

forums.bodybuilding.com will be forums.bodybuilding.com whether or not you install tapatalk. Reddit will be Reddit whether or not you're running AlienBlue. The Wikipedia I pull up on my phone is the same Wikipedia I pull up on my laptop is the same Wikipedia I pull up on my desktop is the same Wikipedia I pull up on my Kindle. There were people that freaked out when they realized that "today's kids have never lived in a time without Internet." They were wrong, too. It's a tool, not a religion, and when you see complaints nailed to the door consider them suggestions, not heresy.


posted 4112 days ago