If you visit a site a lot, you want to install an icon for it. If you're willing to install an icon for it, you prefer the quality and speed of a native experience. That's just common sense.
Funny enough I couldn't find a decent native app for HN, so I just placed a link to the site in my folder with social apps. That site is the worst thing in that folder.
I know a couple people who dislike Reddit's degraded web experience to drive users to their app. I haven't installed the app myself. Maybe it's a minority opinion. But supposedly Reddit has 1.6 billion unique visitors per month, and about 120 million app installs.
Judging by their non-degraded desktop site experience, thank god we have the app. Honestly, Reddit is one of those sites that make me think the world has collectively forgotten how to make a sane site. It takes seconds to load, and almost everything you go means looking at animated placeholders for a time, until something happens.
I have a workstation that deals with 3D rendering and huge Photoshop files, or compiling sizable projects with no problem, and my CPU is still pegged to 100% when I browse Reddit.
I shudder at the thought of those same people being in charge of my mobile experience. I don't feel like having to replace my phone battery every 3 months, thanks.
Installation, push notifications, etc... are all optional and can be mixed and matched based on what users actually want.
An example would be individual forums are a great use case for PWAs.