TL;DR: I'd like to see web notifications improved rather than abandoned because I think they are part of a suite of features that could provide important competition for native apps on mobile devices.
> Somehow, by the time it reaches any of my multiple inboxes it’s not 99% spam
Right. Email providers didn't fix spam by throwing away the ability to send unsolicited messages, they fixed it by looking at the behavior of bad actors and blocking it, and evolving the UX of email services to adapt ("Report Spam" buttons and the like). My comment above was intended to suggest that rather than demanding the industry throw out the feature that would allow a website to send notifications at all, they can instead invest in making the experience more streamlined for the user (fewer notifications, less intrusive request flow). They could even use some of the same techniques used in fighting spam, like allowing users to report sites that are abusive in how they ask for permission.
The subtext here is that I think progressive web apps have the potential to foster a more open online culture than can be achieved through app stores alone, and they also give the user more control over the experience, since they leverage the browser, which is a "user agent" in a way that that apps rarely (if ever) achieve. Adopting a stance that solidifies the current inadequacies of web apps pushes more users and developers to "app store apps", which tilt the balance of power towards app store owners and away from users and developers. I think that trend has already caused problems (Spotify, Fortnite, Librem Tunnel[0], etc.), and I don't see any reason the problems will lessen in the future.
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