[one_off_comment]

If the web was created today, it would not be a set of open protocols, markup languages, etc. It would be a product. That's the world we live in, so that's why journalists and companies chase that vision.

There's obviously no way to be sure, but the only reason the web was created how it was is because it was a bunch of academics, nerds, and hobbyists who saw a need and filled it. There was no perceived money in it from the private sector's point of view. Now that there's no question that there's money to be made, it's like blood in the water. And the capitalist sharks can smell it.

An open standard that's given away for free isn't attractive to the people who have the means to create it.

[psyc]

And it was a trade off. I think most of us are well acquainted with the advertised advantages of open standards and web application architecture as we know it. But it came at the expense of both user experience and developer experience on par with traditional desktop applications. E.g. arbitrary languages (esp. compiled languages), fast graphics, great UI toolkits. We get some approximation of such things at a glacial pace, or it’s always just over the horizon. Everybody is leery of adopting a comprehensive framework only backed by a single corporation (is this what held Java back?) but standards bodies take 20 years to deliver a bright idea like compiling your favorite language to byte code that can execute in the browser.