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> I can’t understand how we got to this place with “app culture”! The short version: ad blockers work on browsers but not apps[0]. [0] https://pluralistic.net

> I can’t understand how we got to this place with “app culture”! The short version: ad blockers work on browsers but not apps[0]. [0] https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/30/go-nuts-meine-kerle https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/30/go-nuts-meine-kerle

CuriouslyC 3mo ago
I don't think that's it. Apps took off because people felt comfortable yoloing stuff from the Apple app store, and for a short while before saturation, the app store reach was making small developers rich.
- reddalo 3mo ago
  Apps took off because Apple did everything they could to make PWAs work badly, with no reliable notifications, no access to some data, etc. Apple did that because they want their sweet 30% from in-app purchases, which they couldn't enforce in PWAs.
  - CuriouslyC 3mo ago
    To be fair, apps took off before nice PWAs that masquerade as apps were a thing. The app store was already thriving to the point of oversaturation when the first versions of React were released.
    - jorisw 3mo ago
      PWAs (progressive web apps) surely existed before React though
      - CuriouslyC 3mo ago
        IIRC, the cutting edge of PWAs when the app store was taking off was Backbone.js, which I don't recall being pleasant enough to work with to want to make anything large in.
        justarobert 3mo ago
        I worked on converting an existing knockoutjs SPA into a PWA around that time. I won't claim it was a pleasant experience but it was probably a lot easier and quicker than a small team of webdevs learning mobile dev and cheaper than a new hire. It wasn't a small or basic app, but we did have the advantage of it being a B2B tool that would only be used on android tablets. IIRC it was going to be either extra work or maybe even impossible to get the same functionality on iOS/safari at the time so we just didn't.
      - crabmusket 3mo ago
        React was open sourced in 2013. Service workers, which I consider to be essential to what we understand as PWAs, shipped first in Chrome in 2015, Safari in 2018.
        jorisw 3mo ago
        Sure. But Jobs was talking about running 'web apps' on iPhone OS as a software distribution channel, pre App Store, 2007-2008.
        jazzypants 3mo ago
        I completely understand the confusion, but "Progressive Web App" or PWA[1], coined by Alex Russell and Frances Berriman[2], has become a specific term for websites that work normally on a pc but can also take advantage of things like push notifications and be installed on the home screen of a phone. You can see a measurable uptick on Google Trends after this blogpost [3]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_web_app https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_web_app [2] https://infrequently.org/2015/06/progressive-apps-escaping-tabs-without-losing-our-soul/ https://infrequently.org/2015/06/progressive-apps-escaping-t... [3] https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=%2Fg%2F11bzxympx6,pwa&date=all&geo=US&legacy&hl=en https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=%2Fg%2F11bzxympx6...
        SquareWheel 3mo ago
        If anyone wishes to remember what that looked like. https://web.archive.org/web/20071012231544/http://www.apple.com/webapps/whatarewebapps.html https://web.archive.org/web/20071012231544/http://www.apple.... https://web.archive.org/web/20071012025941/http://www.apple.com/webapps/ https://web.archive.org/web/20071012025941/http://www.apple....
  - graemep 3mo ago
    Apps also took off on Android and Google likes PWAs. I am not sure about the history, but a lot of it now is about tracking, and perceived security. Its far harder for users to manage things like location tracking in apps than in browsers.
  - faangguyindia 3mo ago
    yes, i am forced to to make a real app because storage is not reliable in PWA, browser or OS can wipe off data. i don't want to pay for servers just to have an app. and updating apps is slow, for flutter you need to pay for shorebird. In react native land, not sure but there are paid stuff like expo? you can self host but usually you end up payign for some OTA provider?
  - imjonse 3mo ago
    apps took off before browsers had the capabilities required for native-like behaviour (fast graphics, hw functionality, notifications) and then were used even for apps that could have been web-apps.
    - asdff 3mo ago
      When apps took off they weren't really making use of any of that either. Top apps back then were either using the standard ux libraries, or they were something like a simulated beer pint. Rehashing of popular flash and flip phone games like bejeweled.
  - al_borland 3mo ago
    The original intent of the iPhone was not to have 3rd party apps at all. Web apps were how developers were supposed to deliver to iPhone users. At the time, web apps weren’t as good as they are today and the market demanded local apps. Jailbreaks happened quickly, delivery systems like Cydia were set up. Apple either had to deliver their own official methods or play a cat and mouse game with hackers while trying to gaslight the public that websites were better than local apps.
    - jonahx 3mo ago
      Historically true, but the original intent quickly dissolved once they app store took off and they realized the cash cow they had on their hands.
  - jghn 3mo ago
    The problem is that for nearly all apps I want them to have neither notifications nor access to data. For instance, with few exceptions, the only apps I allow to give me notifications are the default apple apps, like iMessage. The only reasons I'll use an app over a website is if I have no choice in the matter, or if the app provides an easier UI/UX than the website.
- jorisw 3mo ago
  The App Store took off because of the distribution channel it offers for developers (including being able to charge for the work) and the place of discovery it offers to users.
  - 1970-01-01 3mo ago
    There was and is more than one App Store. You mention other good reasons to develop, but the money from ads was the biggest reason for an app to exist. Otherwise, it could and should just be a website.
datakan 3mo ago
Apple has actually started allowing this. You can find the functionality in an adblocker called Wipr now and it works really well.
- zamadatix 3mo ago
  URL filters in iOS 26 just make network level filtering more convenient (can use a real VPN at the same time) but it's nothing new in terms of replacement for real ad blockers, which is why apps like Wipr still include a Safari extension.
hashworks 3mo ago
For most app ads it's enough to set a DoT or DoH in the system that blocks ad domains. Android supports this with a settings menu entry, on Apple one needs a more "technical" solution I think (loading some XML?). Most VPN apps also support DNS enforcement. Apps like YouTube are an exception, but there are other ways around that on Android.
- matltc 3mo ago
  > YouTube... Ways around that on Android Have DoH/DoT enabled as you mention, then open brave, go to YouTube.com
groundzeros2015 3mo ago
I think it’s that your install base represents real customers who could actually buy things. Web traffic is so diluted and low signal.
xingped 3mo ago
It's too bad not enough people know about using adguard dns on their phones. Dunno about iPhones but it works wonders on Android. Only downside is it sometimes interferes with signing into public wifi networks.
- 1970-01-01 3mo ago
  Does not have to be branded adguard to work. https://github.com/hagezi/dns-blocklists https://github.com/hagezi/dns-blocklists
xtracto 3mo ago
> I can’t understand how we got to this place with “app culture" Thie assertion is extremely funny to me. Historically we come from an "app culture". Back in the day, around 2000 or so, if you wanted some functionality, you ran an application. You ran software in your computer. Then on the early 2000s people started migrating their software web" , inventing "SaaS" (software as a service" . I remember my young self being strongly opposed to that, because I saw little sense in constraining what you could do with a scripting language, when you could easily get the "networking" capabilities adding tcp/ip to your software . But the web and Javascript won, mostly due to control (there was advertising in software since the 90s, for example Opera or GetRight had ad banners) . The feature and mobile phones came and people started to migrate to "apps" again. So we came full circle.
- master-lincoln 3mo ago
  It's because apple pushed towards apps and didn't want web apps on their phone. Likely due to the profits they can gain from appstore sales Native apps would be the better platform in my eyes if the Operating Systems would be better in terms of letting a user manage what a native app have access to and can do. But currently they are preferred by companies despite more dev effort because they can get more user data without the user having easy ways to prevent that. And of course showing ads without the user being easily able to block them
  - inigyou 3mo ago
    There's nothing technical stopping us from investigating and modifying the apps we install - at least on operating systems that allow you to install unapproved apps. YouTube Vanced only got in legal trouble for distributing a copyrighted work (the YouTube app) which led to ReVanced which is a patcher that doesn't include a copy of the original app.
  - dansitu 3mo ago
    You're not wrong at all, but it's interesting that iOS launched with only web app support for third party software, and it took community pressure to persuade them to support native apps. There was not even an app store to begin with.
inigyou 3mo ago
There's also more data you can access from an app than from a browser. E.g. surrounding WiFi networks, battery level, persistent device identifier.
maxgashkov 3mo ago
Two more things: - well-designed apps retain enough state to be useful offline or in places with spotty coverage; PWAs can kinda be made to work like this but IIRC iOS will happily evict them under disk pressure; - notifications. I've read that Apple have implemented them for home screen installed web apps but for reasons unknown I have not seen this in action even once.
afavour 3mo ago
Nah. When the App Store started getting truly popular you couldn't even run an ad blocker on mobile Safari. That came many years later. IMO the reason we got to this place is twofold: - apps give companies a spot on your Home Screen and allow you to develop a habit of opening it. I suspect Apple are very aware of this, which is why they continue to make it very difficult to install a web app to your home screen. - notifications. Which, again, draw a returning audience
a_c 3mo ago
There are surprising portion of population expect a dedicated app to perform a particular function
- stronglikedan 3mo ago
  And that's fine, but if your app is just a wrapper for a website, send people to the website and have a link for them to download the app if they prefer.
autoexec 3mo ago
That and having an app gives you a ton of options for data collection
drnick1 3mo ago
> The short version: ad blockers work on browsers but not apps[0]. It depends where the ads come from. I block ads at the DNS level for example, and there is little apps can do (I also filter public DNS servers by IP to prevent bypass). Not that would use apps that show me ads, or really any commercial apps. If something cannot be done in a browser, I'll simply pass.

CuriouslyC 3mo ago

I don't think that's it. Apps took off because people felt comfortable yoloing stuff from the Apple app store, and for a short while before saturation, the app store reach was making small developers rich.

reddalo 3mo ago
Apps took off because Apple did everything they could to make PWAs work badly, with no reliable notifications, no access to some data, etc. Apple did that because they want their sweet 30% from in-app purchases, which they couldn't enforce in PWAs.
- CuriouslyC 3mo ago
  To be fair, apps took off before nice PWAs that masquerade as apps were a thing. The app store was already thriving to the point of oversaturation when the first versions of React were released.
  - jorisw 3mo ago
    PWAs (progressive web apps) surely existed before React though
    - CuriouslyC 3mo ago
      IIRC, the cutting edge of PWAs when the app store was taking off was Backbone.js, which I don't recall being pleasant enough to work with to want to make anything large in.
      - justarobert 3mo ago
        I worked on converting an existing knockoutjs SPA into a PWA around that time. I won't claim it was a pleasant experience but it was probably a lot easier and quicker than a small team of webdevs learning mobile dev and cheaper than a new hire. It wasn't a small or basic app, but we did have the advantage of it being a B2B tool that would only be used on android tablets. IIRC it was going to be either extra work or maybe even impossible to get the same functionality on iOS/safari at the time so we just didn't.
    - crabmusket 3mo ago
      React was open sourced in 2013. Service workers, which I consider to be essential to what we understand as PWAs, shipped first in Chrome in 2015, Safari in 2018.
      - jorisw 3mo ago
        Sure. But Jobs was talking about running 'web apps' on iPhone OS as a software distribution channel, pre App Store, 2007-2008.
        jazzypants 3mo ago
        I completely understand the confusion, but "Progressive Web App" or PWA[1], coined by Alex Russell and Frances Berriman[2], has become a specific term for websites that work normally on a pc but can also take advantage of things like push notifications and be installed on the home screen of a phone. You can see a measurable uptick on Google Trends after this blogpost [3]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_web_app https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_web_app [2] https://infrequently.org/2015/06/progressive-apps-escaping-tabs-without-losing-our-soul/ https://infrequently.org/2015/06/progressive-apps-escaping-t... [3] https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=%2Fg%2F11bzxympx6,pwa&date=all&geo=US&legacy&hl=en https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=%2Fg%2F11bzxympx6...
        SquareWheel 3mo ago
        If anyone wishes to remember what that looked like. https://web.archive.org/web/20071012231544/http://www.apple.com/webapps/whatarewebapps.html https://web.archive.org/web/20071012231544/http://www.apple.... https://web.archive.org/web/20071012025941/http://www.apple.com/webapps/ https://web.archive.org/web/20071012025941/http://www.apple....
- graemep 3mo ago
  Apps also took off on Android and Google likes PWAs. I am not sure about the history, but a lot of it now is about tracking, and perceived security. Its far harder for users to manage things like location tracking in apps than in browsers.
- faangguyindia 3mo ago
  yes, i am forced to to make a real app because storage is not reliable in PWA, browser or OS can wipe off data. i don't want to pay for servers just to have an app. and updating apps is slow, for flutter you need to pay for shorebird. In react native land, not sure but there are paid stuff like expo? you can self host but usually you end up payign for some OTA provider?
- imjonse 3mo ago
  apps took off before browsers had the capabilities required for native-like behaviour (fast graphics, hw functionality, notifications) and then were used even for apps that could have been web-apps.
  - asdff 3mo ago
    When apps took off they weren't really making use of any of that either. Top apps back then were either using the standard ux libraries, or they were something like a simulated beer pint. Rehashing of popular flash and flip phone games like bejeweled.
- al_borland 3mo ago
  The original intent of the iPhone was not to have 3rd party apps at all. Web apps were how developers were supposed to deliver to iPhone users. At the time, web apps weren’t as good as they are today and the market demanded local apps. Jailbreaks happened quickly, delivery systems like Cydia were set up. Apple either had to deliver their own official methods or play a cat and mouse game with hackers while trying to gaslight the public that websites were better than local apps.
  - jonahx 3mo ago
    Historically true, but the original intent quickly dissolved once they app store took off and they realized the cash cow they had on their hands.
- jghn 3mo ago
  The problem is that for nearly all apps I want them to have neither notifications nor access to data. For instance, with few exceptions, the only apps I allow to give me notifications are the default apple apps, like iMessage. The only reasons I'll use an app over a website is if I have no choice in the matter, or if the app provides an easier UI/UX than the website.
jorisw 3mo ago
The App Store took off because of the distribution channel it offers for developers (including being able to charge for the work) and the place of discovery it offers to users.
- 1970-01-01 3mo ago
  There was and is more than one App Store. You mention other good reasons to develop, but the money from ads was the biggest reason for an app to exist. Otherwise, it could and should just be a website.

datakan 3mo ago

Apple has actually started allowing this. You can find the functionality in an adblocker called Wipr now and it works really well.

zamadatix 3mo ago
URL filters in iOS 26 just make network level filtering more convenient (can use a real VPN at the same time) but it's nothing new in terms of replacement for real ad blockers, which is why apps like Wipr still include a Safari extension.

hashworks 3mo ago

For most app ads it's enough to set a DoT or DoH in the system that blocks ad domains. Android supports this with a settings menu entry, on Apple one needs a more "technical" solution I think (loading some XML?). Most VPN apps also support DNS enforcement. Apps like YouTube are an exception, but there are other ways around that on Android.

matltc 3mo ago
> YouTube... Ways around that on Android Have DoH/DoT enabled as you mention, then open brave, go to YouTube.com

groundzeros2015 3mo ago

I think it’s that your install base represents real customers who could actually buy things. Web traffic is so diluted and low signal.

xingped 3mo ago

It's too bad not enough people know about using adguard dns on their phones. Dunno about iPhones but it works wonders on Android. Only downside is it sometimes interferes with signing into public wifi networks.

1970-01-01 3mo ago
Does not have to be branded adguard to work. https://github.com/hagezi/dns-blocklists https://github.com/hagezi/dns-blocklists

xtracto 3mo ago

> I can’t understand how we got to this place with “app culture" Thie assertion is extremely funny to me. Historically we come from an "app culture". Back in the day, around 2000 or so, if you wanted some functionality, you ran an application. You ran software in your computer. Then on the early 2000s people started migrating their software web" , inventing "SaaS" (software as a service" . I remember my young self being strongly opposed to that, because I saw little sense in constraining what you could do with a scripting language, when you could easily get the "networking" capabilities adding tcp/ip to your software . But the web and Javascript won, mostly due to control (there was advertising in software since the 90s, for example Opera or GetRight had ad banners) . The feature and mobile phones came and people started to migrate to "apps" again. So we came full circle.

master-lincoln 3mo ago
It's because apple pushed towards apps and didn't want web apps on their phone. Likely due to the profits they can gain from appstore sales Native apps would be the better platform in my eyes if the Operating Systems would be better in terms of letting a user manage what a native app have access to and can do. But currently they are preferred by companies despite more dev effort because they can get more user data without the user having easy ways to prevent that. And of course showing ads without the user being easily able to block them
- inigyou 3mo ago
  There's nothing technical stopping us from investigating and modifying the apps we install - at least on operating systems that allow you to install unapproved apps. YouTube Vanced only got in legal trouble for distributing a copyrighted work (the YouTube app) which led to ReVanced which is a patcher that doesn't include a copy of the original app.
- dansitu 3mo ago
  You're not wrong at all, but it's interesting that iOS launched with only web app support for third party software, and it took community pressure to persuade them to support native apps. There was not even an app store to begin with.

inigyou 3mo ago

There's also more data you can access from an app than from a browser. E.g. surrounding WiFi networks, battery level, persistent device identifier.

maxgashkov 3mo ago

Two more things: - well-designed apps retain enough state to be useful offline or in places with spotty coverage; PWAs can kinda be made to work like this but IIRC iOS will happily evict them under disk pressure; - notifications. I've read that Apple have implemented them for home screen installed web apps but for reasons unknown I have not seen this in action even once.

afavour 3mo ago

Nah. When the App Store started getting truly popular you couldn't even run an ad blocker on mobile Safari. That came many years later. IMO the reason we got to this place is twofold: - apps give companies a spot on your Home Screen and allow you to develop a habit of opening it. I suspect Apple are very aware of this, which is why they continue to make it very difficult to install a web app to your home screen. - notifications. Which, again, draw a returning audience

a_c 3mo ago

There are surprising portion of population expect a dedicated app to perform a particular function

stronglikedan 3mo ago
And that's fine, but if your app is just a wrapper for a website, send people to the website and have a link for them to download the app if they prefer.

autoexec 3mo ago

That and having an app gives you a ton of options for data collection

drnick1 3mo ago

> The short version: ad blockers work on browsers but not apps[0]. It depends where the ads come from. I block ads at the DNS level for example, and there is little apps can do (I also filter public DNS servers by IP to prevent bypass). Not that would use apps that show me ads, or really any commercial apps. If something cannot be done in a browser, I'll simply pass.