Web Apps, Desktops and mass adoption

Saw this article by Read/Write Web on Techmeme while drinking morning coffee, it would seem that the "Everything is a Webservice" brigade are beginning to see sense, even if it is being drummed into their heads by others....Josh Catone, talking to his girlfriend:

The conversation I had with my girlfriend went something like this (paraphrasing heavily here):

Her: "So where are my documents stored?"
Me: "On Google's servers."
Her: "And I don't actually own the software?"
Me: "No, you just sort of rent it."
Her: "So if Google goes down, or decides to stop making Docs, they take my software and documents with it?"
Me: "Theoretically that could happen, yeah."
Her: "And if there's a security breach my documents are there for the taking?"
Me: "Technically, yes."
Her: "That's kinda creepy.... I don't think I like that."

I think that's a fairly standard view among mainstream software users.

Actually, the word isn't Mainstream, the word is Sensible. At Broadsight we're as geeky as they come, and we can run a Webservice with our eyes shut (some would argue we do ), but no way would we rely on one for business or personal use, for the exact reasons noted above.

This was brought home to us last year when an experimental site we had on Facebook was summarily shut down, despite being allowed to exist for about 6 months (we were using our blog name, and when Beacon came out we were purged) without any redress. And if you are familiar with the issues around (i) Beacon and (ii) Leaving Facebook you have just had a crash course in the real underlying economics of "free" webservice platforms.

And if you have ever had a 72 hour internet outage, as we had last year, you quickly realise that not having desktop functionality is very, very risky.

In fact one of the main things the "WebService Uber Alles" brigade are very bad at is being clear about quantifying the risks - they are not linear risks but more "disaster" based - ie low probability, but high impact.

And with the launch yesterday of Free Google Platforming, its probably worth re-iterating these points.

As a free service from us, of course ...............

(To be fair, the RWW article is also distinguishing between Web Apps that have persistence on the desktop when disconnected, and proper desktop Apps, but those to me are tactical compared to the strategic issue of how you configure your Client / Server systems)