Tim Bray nails it with this piece. "Not once has an end-user type person written in saying they wished they could have a richer interface like the kind they used to have in compiled desktop apps. I have all sorts of theories about whose interests are being served by these efforts to take us back to the client/server era, but I know for sure that it’s not about making users happy."

My users have taught me that what we call "clients" are actually just interfaces and that they don't care where the interface lives or how it works - as long as it works, and works in a way that they can relate to. As a result, I tend to think of clients and servers as virtual constructs that act more as a touchstones and less as elements in a functional specification. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot to commend rich web clients, but they aren't going to solve the useability problems that the software industry has foisted on its customers over the last twenty years.

Not-too-much-later: Predictably, Scoble as a decidedly different take on things. "If you can find an end user that even knows what a rich client app is I'd be suprised. Tim, you're asking the wrong questions."

I don't think so. Users don't want "Rich Clients" - they want "Functional Clients". Perhaps Microsoft is taking a step in the right direction, perhaps not. The funny thing about this particular angle on the discourse is that Microsoft already has one of the best "clients" in the market today: Hotmail.

Users tend to view Hotmail as email, not as an email client. This tells me a bunch of things, but first and foremost, that Microsoft must have really nailed this client for users to view it as such a transparent part of the experience.

Prediction: Longhorn screws up the email experience for Hotmail users.