Beyond Offline

There is a lengthy ongoing debate on how the Web could compete with the onslaught of native apps on mobile platforms — heck, there is debate on whether it even should. If you agree with Alex Russell, you might agree that transitioning away from the safety of our wired broadband and spacious desktop CRT-s has made our web browsing experience… how should I put it… rather “promiscuous”. Clicking a link or button in your mobile browser while sitting on a train is not that comfortable, rewarding experience any more: compared to desktop, where errors and blank screens were a relatively rare occurrence and mostly the fault of the services themselves, the mobile experience is plagued by fear and anxiety: Will my mobile network hold up? What if there is a tunnel coming up ahead of us? I should have opened this in a new tab so at least I could have read the remainder of my feed while (if ever!) this loads!