Splitting the web in two?

I just read Tom MacWright’s excellent post Clean starts for the web which argues that the web stack has gotten so convoluted, so expensive to maintain browsers for, that it might be time for a clean start.

At one point Tom mentions:

My first thought is that there are two webs:
The document web
/…/
The “application” web

The document being the old school web; wikipedia and news sites, and the application web being all the JS heavy SPAs like Facebook and Netflix.

I think this is an excellent point. There really is a difference between creating documents on the web, and creating interactive tools. One should be simple, one can be allowed to be complex. But I think we’re failing as web developers to imagine tools for creating documents. It’s so much easier to post a tweet, publish a tiktok video or send a snap, than it is to publish a document online.
Which is madness. If we want a living, thriving, open, web and not a series of walled gardens I think it’s time to start taking this seriously.