Developers don't want to have to develop for multiple platforms. There are two ways to solve that: Either develop for a platform which has a monopoly share, or

Developers don't want to have to develop for multiple platforms. There are two ways to solve that: Either develop for a platform which has a monopoly share, or develop cross-platform. Web Applications' ability to work on every platform, combined with an increasing feature-set (thanks to Gears), makes it a very viable platform. The web is Google's domain: The better the web stack works in all platforms (including mobile), the better chance they'll have to beat out Microsoft, Apple, and all the rest.