Comment by chipotle_coyote

I admit to a bit of head-scratching over some the comments here. The most common criticism on HN of Apple's approach to native iOS apps is the way they're locked down through sandboxing and various restrictions in the name of privacy. But a major criticism running throughout these comments of Apple's foot-dragging on supporting various Web APIs is that we should be using PWAs because, compared to native apps, they are locked down through sandboxing and various restrictions in the name of privacy. And... huh.

Yes, I get that in the first case it's Apple setting the restrictions and maintaining the control, and in the latter it's ostensibly open and not controlled by any one party. It's a good principle. But it's easy to forget that the first steps toward web apps were largely taken by Apple back in 2007, with Steve Jobs enthusiastically talking about the "sweet solution" they had for installing third party apps on the iPhone: web apps. There's a future we can imagine where if Apple had stuck to their guns and really ramped up their APIs, PWAs would have taken over mobile computing a decade ago. But they didn't, and the reason they didn't is because both developers and users hated them. Hated hated hated.

"But those web apps sucked and modern ones are much better!" Yes, I agree! But to users, the difference between going to the app store for their platform and downloading Twitter and going to the Twitter web site and tapping "Save as Web App" is pretty minimal, and there is no effective difference between the two once they're installed. Well, I take that back; I don't think a web app can provide a sharing extension, or be automated through Shortcut actions, or offer Siri suggestions. So actually, I'd rather have the real app still, thanks.

And, on point for privacy concerns, for me this isn't as much about "trusting Apple" as not trusting web sites. Yes, I'm sure there are valid reasons for all of these APIs to exist, but when push comes to shove, I'd rather go through the extremely mild inconvenience of having to download an iPad MIDI sequencer as a web app than discover that a web site -- or an advertisement on a web site -- has used that to track me or even deliver a malicious payload to me.