Apple actually fell down on this one; it should be possible to create natively scrolling divs without resorting to JS trickery. (In fairness, Android only acquired this feature very recently.)
> Broadly speaking, investment in mobile webapps largely seems to be about improving the entrenched web developer's experience, rather than the actual user's experience.
While there is some truth to this, it doesn't tell the whole story. Most developers don't have the time or desire to maintain multiple native codebases, and so using web tools improves user experience by allowing the app to exist on their platform at all. Also, sometimes these things come in handy on actual websites (personally, I consider "Click here to download our mobile app!" terrible UX).
> Broadly speaking, investment in mobile webapps largely seems to be about improving the entrenched web developer's experience, rather than the actual user's experience.
While there is some truth to this, it doesn't tell the whole story. Most developers don't have the time or desire to maintain multiple native codebases, and so using web tools improves user experience by allowing the app to exist on their platform at all. Also, sometimes these things come in handy on actual websites (personally, I consider "Click here to download our mobile app!" terrible UX).