Mozilla: Firefox Mobile could be demise of Apple's App Store, Huh?

We’re not sure if the good people at Mozilla have been drinking the same Kool-Aid® as the folks developing Chrome OS or if they are just out of their blessed minds. Mozilla is touting that its mobile version of Firefox, currently codenamed Fennec, could be the beginning of the end for mobile app stores like Apple’s App Store and Android’s Market. Mozilla VP of mobile Jay Sullivan told PC Pro, “Anyone who knows JavaScript and HTML can develop a great app without having to learn a specific mobile platform.” Now, our memories aren’t that great, but didn’t Apple already try this when the iPhone first came out? Isn’t this what Palm’s entire SDK is made of? Didn’t one Steve Jobs upon launching the first iPhone proclaim, that we don’t need native applications, web apps will do everything we want? So as it turns out, he did, and they didn’t. Sullivan continues, “in the interim period, apps will be very successful. Over time, the web will win because it always does.” Are they visionaries or is it a pipe dream from a company whose bread and butter revolves around the browser?  We will see.

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