I don&#x27;t think cpu were ready back then. Sure you had that blackberry thing using the equivalent of the modern embedded webview but you couldn&#x27;t do much heavy lifting with it.<p>Also many standard didn&#x27;t exist. Maybe today, with webgl and asm.js and web workers It&#x27;s viable, but in the days native access was the only way to provide a smooth experience. See: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2012&#x2F;09&#x2F;11&#x2F;mark-zuckerberg-our-biggest-mistake-with-mobile-was-betting-too-much-on-html5&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2012&#x2F;09&#x2F;11&#x2F;mark-zuckerberg-our-biggest...</a>