The obvious answer is that it makes applications portable, which is great. That's an understatement. Anybody trying to write a multiplatform complex desktop ap

The obvious answer is that it makes applications portable, which is great. That's an understatement. Anybody trying to write a multiplatform complex desktop application around 2000 would have learnt that it was way much harder that it sounds today. Browsers were in a very reduced group of success cases. Edit: also dont forget that there was a war about what tools and languages would become dominant. Unlike alternatives, most web tools were free.