The app has been predicted to die for almost as long as it has been around. HTML5 is said to be the final nail in the coffin of the app as the user moves over to the browser.

But I think this is a simplified way to view things. It’s not just a matter of execution environment but rather the entire context and framing.

An app is something that solves a problem. A web page is something that answers a question.

Think about that. An app is the answer when you want to achieve something, be that kill a few minutes on the bus or check your bank account. “There’s an app for that”, right? A web page, on the other hand, contains information. It answers a question. You google for it. The app is what you reach for when you want to perform an action.

Yes, there are overlaps but this is in my opinion the fundamental difference between the two models. Sure, there are other things, more technical. You may argue that apps have icons whereas web pages have URLs (although you of course can make a bookmark that appears identical to an app icon). You may say that apps are native binaries whereas web pages are built on web technologies such as HTML, JavaScript and CSS (although you can write apps using web technologies).

There’s a long list of things that’s different between an app and a web page but I still think that the big and fundamental difference is as stated above: apps solve problems. Web pages answer questions. That’s why they will always coexist.

What do you think?

They already have an Android Appstore and an e-reader tablet. Putting the two together seems like an obvious next steps so the rumors about an Amazon Web Tablet based on Android seems reasonable.
The price of the Kindle is speculated to reach zero by November (the price has been dropping in a straight line since the release of version 1). Maybe the Amazon Web Tablet based on Android will become the premium tablet, of course with full access to the entire Amazon store.
Amazon has lots of other goodies, like the entire EC2 infrastructure with virtual computers in the cloud. This also include the S3 file storage that gets you 5GB of storage for free in their “Cloud Drive” offering.
Amazon has quickly come to dominate online shopping of physical goods. The pieces are coming together for a future where they also dominate in virtual goods sale (e-books, apps, music etc.). The Amazon Web Tablet (and phone?) will be the key to this future and it’s all possible thanks to Android.

The star of the show will of course be the iPad 2. Some are saying that it will hit the stores almost immediately, something that all the Android 3.0 tablets are failing to do even months after their first appearance.

I’m quite happy with my iPad, even though I’m not using it as a note taking tool as I first thought, I’m not sure what would make me want to upgrade. A camera? Perhaps. That’s at least one of the features I’m almost sure to see tomorrow.

So, all we can do is drool over videos such as this one, taken at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona last week:

Updated: Engadget has a review. I like this:

The Honeycomb look and feel certainly has the work of a single mind written all over it — while we know this is very much a team effort (something we discussed with Matias in our interview at CES), it’s also clear that someone is steering the ship with far more resolve than ever before witnessed in this OS. From a purely visual standpoint, Android 3.0 comes together in a far more cohesive manner than any previous iteration of the software, and the changes aren’t just cosmetic.

I doubt it.

Chromium OS was a good idea – a browser based “OS for the cloud”, but Android can be used in basically the same way and has far greater momentum.

OK, so Chrome OS is mainly for netbooks? But, seriously, the only difference between a netbook and a web tablet is that the former has a keyboard and no touch display. Oh, one more thing: the netbook usually runs Windows…

Google has tried building a Chrome Store for buying web apps – but on one is using it. They even have problems with the Android Market. Should they be running two different stores at all? Not the best way to use your resources, I would say.

Chrome OS supposedly boots very fast. So what? I never turn my iPad off and not my Android phone either. They’re not supposed to be rebooted – only sleeping.

If Chrome OS came out two years ago, when netbooks ruled the world, it would have been a great competitor to Windows. But today, no – let it go, Google. Focus your energy on making Android the best it can be.

When it comes to features it’s hard to beat the Motorola Xoom tablet. With the NVIDIA Tegra 2 Dual Core processor and 1280×800 resolution it’s sure to be a stunning gaming and video machine. 4G (LTE) is coming to make sure you can stream videos fast enough.

But there’s more than just muscles. It’s the first device with Android 3.0. Google Books comes included. A mysterious music sync feature is reported to be included.

The big question is if Google can keep backwards compatibility together or if we will see fragmentation on Android as we’ve seen in so many other mobile OSes in the past.

Some things they did “wrong”:

The name. You’re not supposed to give your phone a name. It’s supposed to be called a letter and a number. Yeah, the RAZR was cool, but that was it.

One device. You’re not supposed to have only one device. That’s madness! You should cover every possible segment of the market with various flavours of the same platform. In fact, you should use many platforms and OSes just to be “safe”.

Full post here.