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I think it's a very broad article written from a consumer's perspective, but I do think realtime APIs are the future of data on the internet. There are several

I think it's a very broad article written from a consumer's perspective, but I do think realtime APIs are the future of data on the internet. There are several reasons beyond mere user-convenience that make it so. Realtime data is more efficient to deliver to clients - Also, all new front-end frameworks encourage consuming data passively (data binding) as opposed to explicitly requesting it on every page change. It's a natural progression. I think REST APIs will stick around for a while, but having worked with both paradigms, I have no doubt that realtime data channels are the future of data consumption.

hliyan 11y ago
I agree. I think the concept of a 'page' is being slowly replaced with two-way data streams (for example, SPAs that rely on WebSockets).
harperlee 11y ago
Perhaps both things will remain: providers of fixed resources to be consumed (the space that the article points to, where I can find more content than I can consume in my lifespan), and services that provide curation (as facebook), that have a more tangible need for that bidirectionality. At the beginning of the web, the emphasis was more in the share-all-resources side of the equation; whereas now, "you need to have a platform, content is provided by users" is the norm. This does not need to stay like that, and as authors and users in general wise up about how content is created, who owns it, and where the value is, perhaps, there will be a comeback. We are seeing an increase in walled newspapers, for example(1). There are initiatives to support creators, as kickstarter or patreon. Social networks "gentrify", and younger generations show that having a large user base has a lot of inertia on cohorts, but perhaps not so much across generations. Why shouldn't Facebook pay the promqueen that drives hundreds of new users into a platform? So perhaps that's a trend that will reverse itself. (1) Not a very good example because traditionally papers are both curators and creators, but still. Also, all creators decide what to create and what not, to a point.

hliyan 11y ago

I agree. I think the concept of a 'page' is being slowly replaced with two-way data streams (for example, SPAs that rely on WebSockets).

harperlee 11y ago

Perhaps both things will remain: providers of fixed resources to be consumed (the space that the article points to, where I can find more content than I can consume in my lifespan), and services that provide curation (as facebook), that have a more tangible need for that bidirectionality. At the beginning of the web, the emphasis was more in the share-all-resources side of the equation; whereas now, "you need to have a platform, content is provided by users" is the norm. This does not need to stay like that, and as authors and users in general wise up about how content is created, who owns it, and where the value is, perhaps, there will be a comeback. We are seeing an increase in walled newspapers, for example(1). There are initiatives to support creators, as kickstarter or patreon. Social networks "gentrify", and younger generations show that having a large user base has a lot of inertia on cohorts, but perhaps not so much across generations. Why shouldn't Facebook pay the promqueen that drives hundreds of new users into a platform? So perhaps that's a trend that will reverse itself. (1) Not a very good example because traditionally papers are both curators and creators, but still. Also, all creators decide what to create and what not, to a point.