[gruseom]

I agree that web apps that try to be desktop apps seem destined to come out the loser in that comparison. The interesting things in web apps are those that leverage the web itself. (Not, as you said, to take away from the impressive technical achievement here.)

Re fast vs. sluggish: which browser did you use? The next generation of browsers (e.g. Safari 3) is so much more responsive that the answer to this question would be revealing.