I like to think that as web apps take off, we might see the emergence of one or more frameworks that specialize in rendering pure documents for the person who doesn't want to use javascript or wants minimal loading of assets.
The reason I suggest this might happen is that for years we've been trying to get away with munging the visual design while still preserving the notion of the document. Web apps take it to the extreme where documents are most often deliver as pure data (i.e. JSON). This move towards having all content as pure data is a great first step towards supplying the content for a pure text only framework.
I like this possible direction the world can take much more. Progressive enhancement was flawed from the start. Let interfaces be super rich, but supplied by content in pure data form that can also be delivered via the simplest interface ever, like basic semantic HTML.
The reason I suggest this might happen is that for years we've been trying to get away with munging the visual design while still preserving the notion of the document. Web apps take it to the extreme where documents are most often deliver as pure data (i.e. JSON). This move towards having all content as pure data is a great first step towards supplying the content for a pure text only framework.
I like this possible direction the world can take much more. Progressive enhancement was flawed from the start. Let interfaces be super rich, but supplied by content in pure data form that can also be delivered via the simplest interface ever, like basic semantic HTML.