Mark Zuckerberg: Our Biggest Mistake Was Was Betting Too Much On HTML5

[RichardWatson]

http://techcrunch.com/2012/09/11/mark-zuckerberg-our-biggest-mistake-with-mobile-was-betting-too-muc...

Today, Mark Zuckerberg revealed that Facebook�??s mobile strategy relied too much on HTML5, rather than native applications.

Not only was this a big mistake with mobile, but Zuckerberg says that its biggest mistake period was the focus on HTML5. This is the first time that the Facebook CEO has openly admitted this, but things are looking good for the new iOS native app. According to Zuckerberg, people are consuming twice as many feed stories since the update to the new iOS app, which is great.

The first half year has been a little bit slow on product, but for the next six months I expect a lot of really cool stuff.

This �??really cool stuff�?� will probably have monetization in mind, as it�??s very clear that mobile is the path to ad revenue for the company.

It�??s extremely difficult for a company to nose-dive into an adoption of a particular set of tools and then quickly change course. I suspect that this is exactly what happened with Facebook and things are at least looking up.

[derekswingley1]

I saw this as well... not quite sure why you posted here, but I'm guessing the intent is to start a discussion relating to the viability of HTML5 as an application platform?

I think Zuck's proclamation will make plenty of headlines over the next few days but will be largely forgotten in a couple of months. Once the smoke clears, HTML5 will still be a great way to build exciting, useful apps. And I will continue to urge people to choose web apps over native for several reasons. Not only is development, testing and deployment easier and faster, there are tons of stats out there that drive home why you should choose web over native. I don't have links handy, but one that has stuck with me is that the average person uses roughly six apps per week while they visit over 20 sites per day. Which category would you be more confident in? Is your app good enough to be one of six used per week by a user? Or is it more realistic to break into one of the more than 20 used per day?

We should also remember that what's best for Facebook isn't necessarily best for us. Hopefully whatever you're building isn't as complex as Facebook. When you're building a targeted application, HTML5 is still plenty capable.

I can't help but feel this is an "HTML5 is dead! Long live HTML5!" moment.

[StephenLead]

Great stats in that linked article on Denver - thanks for sharing

[JeffPace]

FOr us it is a simple matter of resources.  We have 1 (maybe 1.5) developers.  Do we maintain one HTML5 app, which is difficult enough to keep current with dojo/api updates, or do we maintain 3 or 4 separate apps (ios, android, winmob at a minimum, plus a web app that cant go away) each with their own suite of requirements.

The choice for us was very, very obvious.

[derekswingley1]

More context for Zuckerberg's quote:

When I�??m introspective about the last few years I think the biggest mistake that we made, as a company, is betting too much on HTML5 as opposed to native�?� because it just wasn�??t there. And it�??s not that HTML5 is bad. I�??m actually, on long-term, really excited about it. One of the things that�??s interesting is we actually have more people on a daily basis using mobile Web Facebook than we have using our iOS or Android apps combined. So mobile Web is a big thing for us.

http://blog.tobie.me/post/31366970040/when-im-introspective-about-the-last-few-years-i

[RichardWatson]

Here is a recent, interesting, and relevant discussion of performance when developing JavaScript applications:

http://marakana.com/s/post/1314/steve_newcomb_html5_solving_performance_2d_3d_web_apps_video

There are actually quite a number of interesting recent videos from the HTML5 Dev Conf here:

http://marakana.com/s/post/1307/html5_developer_conference_videos

Here is a good one from Facebook:

http://marakana.com/s/post/1309/keeping_the_dream_alive_facebook_james_pearce_html5_video

I would summarize this information as "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly".