As these technologies become more common and iPhones continue to become faster, it's easy to see how the future web applications could replace some of the current native App Store apps.

There's nothing terribly new here, but it does reprise the ongoing debate - are native apps really the mobile platform of the future? Or as browser capabilities and network speed improves, does the web/cloud win?

Is there any benefit to a downloadable application? Everyone says local storage for offline access. True in the near term, but again, as carriers continue to improve their networks and wifi seems to be everywhere - including in-flight, will we really need local storage?

I believe that mobile will follow the desktop trend and ultimately move away from native apps and more towards web/cloud-based functionality. The real question is how long it takes.