Is Apple bypassing the Web?
June 18, 2011 12:02 PM   Subscribe

Is Apple bypassing the Web? Is Apple's grand strategy based on going right around the Web? Maybe so, and the inventor of the Web's fears are one step closer to being realized.

Alasdair Allan (Twitter), an iPhone developer and astronomer, brings together some recent developments and argues for an emergent pattern. First, the iTunes store, from which people purchase* both media and apps, is a creature of internet and local clients, not involving Web browsers. Second, the recently announced iCloud service follows a similar, browser-less pattern: server, client, content. Third, Apple's business model is based on "sell[ing] hardware, applications, and content", none of which requires the World Wide Web at all. Fourth (and least persuasively, for me) the company seems to be decreasing its emphasis on HTML5.

I would add a few more details, based on some counterarguments, and to make sure this isn't a single-link post.
What about Apple making the Safari browser, whose Webkit materials are at Chrome's core? Yes, those things exist, but Safari has a tiny browser market share, especially on laptops/desktops, and Chrome (a far more widely used browser) is entirely a Google thing now.
What about Apple's own Web authoring tool, iWeb? I don't know what proportion of Web content is authored by iWeb, but would guess something really tiny. It might be going away, too.
What about iTunes using URLs? These exist and are used, but solely to kick the user away from Web browsers and into the desktop iTunes program.

In short, is this true, that Apple is going around the Web? If so, what does it mean for the future of the Web?

To be clear, I'm not writing this as an Apple-basher (am primarily a PC user, and teacher of iLife for digital storytelling), nor was Allan. I don't have a dog in the Apple/Windows fight, although they are entertaining and as inevitable as tides. Instead I was and remain persuaded by Sir Time's 2010 nightmare. I'm worried that it's being realized in several ways (this theory is only one), and would be happy to be convinced it's not.

*Yes, some iTunes material is free of charge, like most podcasts. My sense is that the majority isn't: apps, music, tv shows, movies, etc.
posted by doctornemo (35 comments total)

This post was deleted for the following reason: hiya -- you probably want to post a few links here a little bit absent some of the personal opinion stuff. Not that ideas aren't great and links to things to talk about aren't great, but sharing stuff on the web needs to be a little more stuff and a little less your thoughts about stuff. No big deal and a do over tomorrow would probably be just fine. -- jessamyn



 
Good grief. GYOB.
posted by hippybear at 12:06 PM on June 18, 2011 [1 favorite]


Clever, doctornemo is bypassing the web by posting more of himself and less of the web. It is thematic!
posted by TwelveTwo at 12:08 PM on June 18, 2011 [4 favorites]


All was good, until the more inside was clicked.
posted by Ironmouth at 12:09 PM on June 18, 2011 [1 favorite]


hippybear, I don't follow. Is this too long?
(I'm still new to this place!)
posted by doctornemo at 12:09 PM on June 18, 2011


This is an interesting question, and I feel that there could be a really nuanced discussion over it. But the bulk of this is really something that ought to be in its own blog.

If you wrote up your thoughts somewhere else, and went into more detail than you're going into here, I feel it would make for a good post, and I'd have no qualms about posting it. Though I think that to really be best-of-the-webby it would have to have more substance than your simply asking the question. You've got a provocative angle that I don't feel is explicitly pro- or anti-Apple. Flesh out your thoughts a bit and write it down somewhere.
posted by Rory Marinich at 12:09 PM on June 18, 2011


Ironmouth, was *that* too long? I can delete.
Sorry, if so - I wanted to make sure this was supported.
posted by doctornemo at 12:10 PM on June 18, 2011


The problem is mostly a matter of content. It is all your content. We want links and the quiet discipline of a well curated gallery.
posted by TwelveTwo at 12:10 PM on June 18, 2011 [1 favorite]


(Think of MetaFilter as just that, a filter. Posts can be as long or as short as you'd like, but they exist to filter the rest of the web, not to say something new themselves. (Though sometimes they can say things by phrasing a bunch of links into a conversation.)
posted by Rory Marinich at 12:11 PM on June 18, 2011


I can certainly do that elsewhere, Rory. Did I hit a length limit?
posted by doctornemo at 12:11 PM on June 18, 2011


doctornemo: if you're being new here, I'll explain.

You spent too much time talking about your own thoughts and feelings and observations. MetaFilter is for sharing what you've found with others, not a personal soapbox for your views and issues. If you have views and issues to share, the way to approach it is to do it in the comment thread of someone else's post on a topic, or to make your FPP as neutral as possible and then start adding your own views after an hour or two of others having their say and observations about what you posted.

GYOB means Get Your Own Blog, because your post is pretty much what someone might write on their LiveJournal or other personal website.
posted by hippybear at 12:11 PM on June 18, 2011


TwelveTwo, my basis was Allan's post. Should I have just put that here, with that summary in "more", leaving out my bits at the end?
posted by doctornemo at 12:12 PM on June 18, 2011


The front page is not the place to post your opinions. This would have been a good post if you had omitted the [more inside].
posted by ryanrs at 12:13 PM on June 18, 2011


hippybear, I am new here, hence my not understanding an acronym I haven't seen before.

I have several blogs, in fact, and can head there with all of this. Would you object if I create a new post with just Allan's link?
posted by doctornemo at 12:13 PM on June 18, 2011


Understand, I think the content of the articles you've linked are interesting. As the first comment says, maybe you can try again tomorrow with something more MetaFilter appropriate. Because it is an interesting topic.
posted by hippybear at 12:13 PM on June 18, 2011


Funnily enough, I think if everything in the [More Inside] had been put in a comment, I don't think anyone would have a problem.
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 12:13 PM on June 18, 2011 [6 favorites]


But doctornemo, that's the thing. Allan's post is your basis, but the bulk of your post is your own speculation.

I feel this post could have worked if you posted Allan's thing, linked to the Berners-Lee post, and then waited for a conversation to start before posting your thoughts.
posted by Rory Marinich at 12:14 PM on June 18, 2011


Also, single link posts are good. Meandering filler get deleted.
posted by ryanrs at 12:15 PM on June 18, 2011 [1 favorite]


TwelveTwo, my basis was Allan's post. Should I have just put that here, with that summary in "more", leaving out my bits at the end?

Yeah. If it were just the links, and less you, then it would work. The art of the Front Page Post is Zen, you must yourself be silent so that the silent may speak.
posted by TwelveTwo at 12:15 PM on June 18, 2011


ryanrs, I'm not sure I follow. From what I can see of the front page, this post appears only as three sentences, about that O'Reilly post, with a link to a previous MeFi discussion. Would it have been better as just that first sentence alone?

I appreciate your rapid-fire comments, guys. I'm sorry to have made a mess.
posted by doctornemo at 12:16 PM on June 18, 2011


Tough crowd!
posted by diogenes at 12:16 PM on June 18, 2011


Would you object if I create a new post with just Allan's link?

What you should do is wait until tomorrow, then post just your first and third sentences. Skip everything else.
posted by ryanrs at 12:16 PM on June 18, 2011


Ah, thanks, East Manitoba... I hadn't thought of adding that content to a reply. Works for me.
posted by doctornemo at 12:17 PM on June 18, 2011 [1 favorite]


Don't skip the second sentence. There's nothing wrong with that.
posted by Rory Marinich at 12:17 PM on June 18, 2011


Non-compliant FPP aside, can we actually talk about the main topic? Is Apple trending toward bypassing the web? I feel that reducing the web to a collection of approved access channels to controlled content would be disastrous.
posted by Nomyte at 12:18 PM on June 18, 2011


I'm going to hold off on discussing the main topic until we have a thread that won't be deleted by the end of the hour.

But I think the stuff about how Jobs hates Internet Porn is super relevant.
posted by TwelveTwo at 12:19 PM on June 18, 2011


Apple was the first company to bring us a really good mobile web experience. Sure they like apps, but the seem to try to bring the web to their customers in a big way too.
posted by Bovine Love at 12:19 PM on June 18, 2011


Nomyte: it's already that, isn't it? Facebook, NYT (in theory), Wall Street Journal... not to mention browser interfaces for legacy content like gopher and such....
posted by hippybear at 12:19 PM on June 18, 2011 [1 favorite]


JOBS SMASH INTERNET PORN
posted by TwelveTwo at 12:19 PM on June 18, 2011


Yeah, no big deal doctornemo. It was a fine post with some minor new user mistakes, nothing to take to heart.
posted by geoff. at 12:20 PM on June 18, 2011


I would argue against posting your opinions as the first comment of the thread. Just leave them out entirely.
posted by ryanrs at 12:20 PM on June 18, 2011


In related news, Gopher is accused of bypassing established FTP protocols.
posted by charlie don't surf at 12:21 PM on June 18, 2011


IOW, GYOB does not mean GYOFirstComment.
posted by ryanrs at 12:21 PM on June 18, 2011


Or, as I said, make the post and step back for an hour or so and then start participating.

If you leap in too early to your own FPP with your opinions, it looks like you have an agenda and are trying to steer the conversation which should develop naturally.
posted by hippybear at 12:21 PM on June 18, 2011


On the plus side, this makes me excited for tomorrow, because the question you asked has me thinking, and I feel like maybe we could have a discussion that doesn't end in GRAR APPLE GRAR for once that also isn't YAY APPLE YAY.

Nomyte: I feel that they're not actively trying to bypass the web. They're dedicated to giving Apple users very powerful web browsers, after all. (Safari for iOS was revolutionary.) However, as John Gruber wrote earlier this week on Daring Fireball, Apple prefers their applications to be local apps rather than web apps, and this iCloud framework supports native apps over web.

The web won't go away, certainly, but there're a whole bunch of things that don't really need to be web sites to work, and a whole bunch of designers who'd rather people see their programs run exactly the way they want to (rather than rendering differently on each browser, or than letting people modify and deconstruct the web how they see fit). I'm not one of those designers; I like giving people flexibility, even if it means some browsers don't show my designs' utter perfections. But some of my favorite programs are great because they're so tight.
posted by Rory Marinich at 12:22 PM on June 18, 2011


doctornemo: if you're being new here, I'll explain.
Typically we don't waste a bunch of comments talking about how bad the FPP is either. The page text and the first paragraph were fine. The rest of the MI should probably have been a comment.

Still, the post wasn't that bad.
posted by delmoi at 12:23 PM on June 18, 2011


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