I have several more things to say in the Web apps vs. native apps debate, and I’ve decided that a few smaller posts treating just one subject would be the best form. Today we kick off with the Cocoa Touch framework.

John Gruber wants me to mention the Cocoa Touch framework. He feels that its excellence is an important factor in the success of native iPhone apps.

Point is, although Gruber’s probably right, he ought to be wrong.

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Well, that was an interesting ride. Besides passionate agreements, my previous post also elicited passionate disagreements.

My post could be construed as a rant. Hell, parts of it were a rant. (Nobody said this blogging stuff is easy, especially when you’re passionate about something. But if I can’t speak my mind here, what’s the point of having a blog?)

Several people I respect a lot said that I’d made a stupid mistake and was just plain wrong. After some thought I decided they are right.

I was wrong about Web apps being able to replace native apps right now. I was wrong about the iPhone developers’ mindset. They aren’t stupid.

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In his “Apple’s mistake” essay Paul Graham makes an unwarranted assumption; an assumption everybody who’s currently involved in the Great App Store Debate seems to be making.

The fundamental problem on the iPhone is not Apple’s App Store approval policies, but the iPhone developers’ arrogant disdain for Web technologies.

It was only last Friday I told a roomful of Web developers that Apple is evil, and a spontaneous applause erupted. Since then, however, I have changed my mind completely. The Web developers and I were wrong.

Apple is not evil. iPhone developers are stupid. Their problems with the App Store approval process are entirely their own fault and they deserve no commiseration.

I hope the App Store approval process sticks around for a loooooooong time.

Update: I was wrong about Web apps being able to replace native apps right now. I was wrong about the iPhone developers’ mindset. They aren’t stupid. Read my follow-up post.

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I’ve now uploaded both my Fronteers 2009 and my Full Frontal 2009 presentations to both Slideshare and QuirksMode. The two presentations are the same for about 60%, the rest is different, mainly because I had less time at Full Frontal and it was a JavaScript conference. Therefore I added a bit about JavaScript performance and removed quite a few subjects I discussed at Fronteers 2009, including, sadly, the nice historical intro.

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Well, Fronteers 2009 was an astounding success if the Twitterfeed is to be believed. That’s good because it cost us an astounding time to arrange it all.

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