This morning upon seeing this headline, I took a break from reading my email, queueing up posts to my blogs, and checking my feeds to contemplate the idea of a quieter world without some of the giants of internet content.  

The author of this article from Forbes Magazine feels that the web page interface will become obsolete as people rely more on mobile devices. He also suggests that the giants of today are too large to adapt within the next 5 years to the coming Mobile generation, and that web based business will see rapid decline in relevance.  He claims, “We will never have Web 3.0, because the Web’s dead.” 

His sentiment presents Moore’s law as it might apply to the businesses that profit from technology, and at first read the examples seem convincingly familiar enough to be logical, (especially if you give him the benefit of the doubt that by “Web” he means the computer based interface, not the Internet itself.)  The author’s assertion that Web and Social are the dying predecessors of Mobile is completely apples and oranges—both Google and Facebook have apps as ubiquitous on mobile devices as they are on a browser.

Luckily for all of us who still may want to use the Web 5 years from now, the fundamental drive behind the adaptation of new technology is to serve and benefit the user.  Any and all methods that fulfill that function will survive. People with smart phones don’t chuck their computers; and apps don’t entirely replace applications.  Technology may advance at exponential speeds, but the needs of the majority of users do not. 

While I understand the practical reasons for streamlining the mobile format, I still prefer the visual experience of a web page, and I don’t expect that any improvements in mobile apps will change my desire to see some things on a larger screen. If Forbes readers are looking for the next thing to invest in, I’d be on a durable pocket device with a foldable/flexible color screen, crazy fast Internet, and power enough to run Photoshop like a hobo on a sandwich.