I have always thought that Apps were a backward step from standards based delivery, i.e. web browsers. Writing the same functionality in three languages for different delivery channels, Android, iOS and browser is a touch of madness. The need to be online to use a mobile friendly web-site is getting to be less of an issue as solutions, such as Service Workers and solutions to Lie-Fi, mature. I can give you many examples of where an app is a much less satisfactory experience than the mobile web version.

Then we have the pure pain of having to have so many irritating programs installed that are not just installed but bought and paid for. Do we really want t0 have them downloaded yet again when an update is required?

It all reminds me of the bad old pre internet days when networks were local, code was embedded, and applications were distributed. A bit like having a car of a particular type to travel from London to Manchester and then another type of car to travel from London to Bristol. In the modern world authentication should live at the device level, transport should be encrypted and the view layer should be served by a single application (a browser).

At the infrastructure level containers allow us to easily deploy solutions built from independent parts. Architectural design has moved towards service and micro services breaking features into sections of functionality that are called on demand. Data is remote, interconnected and accessible from anywhere.

With so many flexible and fluid segments essential to our technological needs why would we want applications that are canned like tins on a shelf rather than on demand when required? Is this not after all what a being connected the network is all about? Information needs to be joined together and blended before it gives us its insights.

Apps do not lend themselves to the kind of promiscuity required of really useful modern software and systems. They may offer pre arranged marriages with approved partners. Not necessarily partners of our choosing and not without contractual consequences (e.g. you can add this data to there but no where else!).

API’s may, at the interface level, be replaced by what Google describe as ‘capabilities to deliver a user experience that evolves from pages in browser tabs to immersive, top-level apps, leveraging the web’s low friction’. The one thing you can be sure of is that the demise of the App will make technological functionality less expensive and allow the user to do more of what they want rather than what the App producer can generate revenue from.