Already there's some great discussion happening regarding Ebrahim Ezzy's post on\nRead/WriteWeb entitled Webified\nDesktop Apps vs Browser-based Apps. As I noted in the intro to that post, in some ways Ebrahim's\nviews contradict my own.

I'm a big fan of the concept of the browser as a 'lowest common denominator' platform\nfor the Web. And there is a lot of innovation happening in the browser space right now -\nFlock, Opera, Firefox and even IE7 is doing its bit to keep up (although we're still\nwaiting for some truly original knock-yer-socks-off features from IE7). So I like to\nthink there is plenty more innovation to come in the browser - and imho the WebOS players\nare one of the more interesting set of startups using the browser as a platform. I also\nlike the technology being delivered by Personalized Start Pages and associated widgets\n(Pageflakes, Netvibes, et al) and Web Office contenders (Zoho, Zimbra, ThinkFree, et\nal).

Having said that, I do recognize that the browser has its limitations and that Ajax\nisn't the be all and end all of interactive technology. My profile\nof the upcoming NY Times Reader showed some of the possibilities of a web-enabled desktop\napp (or a webified desktop app, to use Ebrahim's term). Times Reader has rich\nfunctionality, courtesy of Microsoft's Windows Presentation Foundation technology - but\nit also relies on the Web to get the NY Times content and to communicate with other\npeople (email a story, for example).

Other discussion on Ebrahim's post:

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• Ryan Stewart: \"The best RIAs\nprovide a layer of abstraction over both the web and the desktop. The Webified desktop\napplication, as Ebrahim uses the term, implies installation, which is an old, antiquated\nmodel for software delivery.\"
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• Tim Bart: \"I\npersonally prefer Desktop application over web-based applications, but I appreciate being\nable to access to my data from anywhere, and get it synchronised over multiple\napplications.\"
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• Alex Iskold calls it the\n\"webification\" of the desktop and mentions desktop widgets as an example. He notes:\n\"There is no reason why our desktop applications can not be web-aware. An improvement in\nthis area would drive up our productivity, because switching back and forth between the\napplication and the browser is very inefficient.\"
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• \nBuzzSort is firmly in favor of webified desktop apps and dislikes webtops: \"It is a great technological\ntrick taking this platform we have within the web browser, one that is restricted in such\na tight way, and make it attempt to mirror your computer desktop. It is however a step\nbackwards to a thin client way of working.\"
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• Emre Sokullu is \nin favor of browser-based apps, \"except web based operating systems\". He says\nsomething that I always point out too: \"Connectivitity should not be seen as a drawback\nbecause the world is getting more and more connected everyday.\"
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• Eric also \nprefers web apps: \"Web applications have a number of advantages not easily duplicated\nby desktop applications; sharing, collaboration, platform agnosticism, stability, low\nrisk of data loss, accessibility.\"
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• John Milan does the numbers on desktop vs browser apps for email.
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There are other\ngreat comments to Ebrahim's post and I encourage you to leave your comment there too.\nPerhaps the biggest point to make is that it's not either/or, despite the headline I\nwrote for the previous post! There is a place for both webified desktop apps and\nbrowser-based apps. Indeed the browser is basically just a desktop app at its most\ngeneric.

The biggest advantage the browser still has though is its ubiquity on computers\n- and we'll continue to need common Web platforms, that utilize web standards, for quite\nsome time yet.

UPDATE: We've published a poll, for you to tell us which type of app you prefer - desktop or browser-based.