The native desktop application has been replaced for all but the most complex and inertia-driven established behemoths. Was there technical merit in moving desk

The native desktop application has been replaced for all but the most complex and inertia-driven established behemoths. Was there technical merit in moving desktop applications to the browser in the first place throughout the 2000s? In most cases: no. All of the functionality of the web interfaces could have been written as more performant native desktop analogues, but it's 2019 now and starting on the web is the defacto default while making a desktop application is the exception.