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Interestingly enough isn't that how iOS started out? At least to some extend. It would be interesting to know how mobile/web would look today if Apple didn't introduce native apps and instead fully committed to web apps.
I remember reading that Steve Jobs originally wanted the iPhone only to run web apps. That's why the "Add site to homescreen"-option has always been in the browser. Then jailbreakers came along, and demanded to be able to run native code, and boom, Apple agrees and we have the App Store. It's interesting how opinions can change, and choices strike back.
The big difference is that all the apps on the original iPhone were native apps, so the iPhone javascript interfaces were missing a lot of features. All the apps on the original WebOS phones were actually web apps, so their javascript interfaces didn't suck.