Patrick Logan:

"Both the .Net and the Java deployment technologies will lead to improvements in the "rich client" experience. The browser is just an interpreter that maps a textual (HTML) description to a set of UI components. Easing the deployment of other "rich interpreters" of content will lead to a middle ground - not a monolithic browser, not a set of monolithic "full client" applications. Rather a collection of componentized "rich content interpreters" deployed over the network."

It's my opinion that many people think the Internet is "just another media" for two reasons:

• they think the web is the Internet


• static html sites don't help non-technical people figure that one can do a lot of things online besides repurposing dead-tree content


• they're stupid and they don't even know it (that's for the dismissive and full-of-themselves I-knew-the-whole-web-fad-would-go-away sort, not the plain uneducated)

Ok, that's three. Anything that lets people experience the Internet as an application will help change mindsets. The Internet is a tool, a two-way interface with the world, not a media you're being passively talked to through.