Single codebase for multiple platforms, no app store approvals/revenue share required, openable via a link, works to the webs' strengths, etc. That sort of stuff. It has its own set of disadvantages too of course.
Hasn’t pretty much every Silicon Valley tech company that tried to use single-condensed Cross platform apps essentially come to the conclusion that they’re not worth it, or better than OS-specific codebases and proper separation of UI and logic?
Native is obviously better and always will be. Making cross platform apps is not worth it only if you can easily afford to go native. This is obviously not true for everyone.
>no app store approvals/revenue share required[...]
Software was distributed long before those walled gardens came into existence. It is as possible as ever to install native software on your machine without having to go through a "store."
>openable via a link[...]
I don't follow. Do you mean a hyperlink from within a browser? I suppose, if one really wanted, it wouldn't take much effort to create such a thing for launching their native applications, but why would that be an advantage: "links" to open applications have existed as icons and various other actions for as long as graphical UIs have been in existence.
>works to the webs' strengths
What does this mean? What advantages do PWAs have, garnered from the Web, that native applications are unable to tap in to?
What’s the likelihood that people are going to put their credit card information into some unknown website compared to using Apple/Google for payments?
Every “advantage” you mentioned is better for the developer not the user. That’s why PWA’s will never take off.
> What’s the likelihood that people are going to put their credit card information into some unknown website compared to using Apple/Google for payments?
Outside of HN's bubble, people do that all the time. Or at worst they will use PayPal or an equivalent to make payments.
It’s outside of the HN bubble that people are less trusting of random websites.
If people were so willing to make payments on random websites, merchants wouldn’t be falling all over themselves to use Amazon’s marketplace and sell their self published books through Kindle.
Not to mention that micropayments on the web has been the holy grail that no one has found in over two decades.
Apple was the first to make $0.99 payments over the internet feasible with iTunes back in 2005. There is much more friction to buying something on the web than just clicking on buy from Amazon/Apple/Google.
> If people were so willing to make payments on random websites, merchants wouldn’t be falling all over themselves to use Amazon’s marketplace and sell their self published books through Kindle.
People fall all over themselves to use Amazon's marketplace because
- it has a lower barrier to entry to setting up and managing a store themselves
- it has a built-in audience they can access without trying to hustle their proprietary domain name into the public consciousness (SEO is hard)
What on earth gives you the idea that it has anything to do with people's willingness or lack thereof to make payments on random websites?
> There is much more friction to buying something on the web than just clicking on buy from Amazon/Apple/Google.
Again, low-friction payment platforms that aren't "use Apple/Google's in-app payment SDKs" are readily available in 2020. PayPal is one such, Flutterwave is another (in sub-Saharan Africa), etc. In fact, I use those far more in a month than I've ever used Apple or Google Pay.
because
- it has a lower barrier to entry to setting up and managing a store themselves - it has a built-in audience they can access without trying to hustle their proprietary domain name into the public consciousness (SEO is hard)
So the same advantages that using the App Store had over going to random websites and installing J2Me apps back in the day....
Again, low-friction payment platforms that aren't "use Apple/Google's in-app payment SDKs" are readily available in 2020. PayPal is one such, Flutterwave is another (in sub-Saharan Africa), etc. In fact, I use those far more in a month than I've ever used Apple or Google Pay.
You realize Apple has had more users payment information on file than any other company since the iTunes heyday than maybe Amazon?
