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What I find unsettling about the desire to make everything web-based is the
problem of securing such, keeping out the unwelcome, unwashed masses. I am
also less than exuberant about stateless connections, but that's another
topic. Whereas something closer to a terminal emulator requires somewhat
more 'intelligence' (primarily in the form of software, and probably in the
form of an understanding user) on the client side. By intelligence, I also
mean something along the lines of what Nicholas Negroponte discusses in
Being Digital ('selected bits' available digitally at
http://www.obs-us.com/obs/english/books/nn/bdcont.htm). But having an
intelligent client can somewhat limit what inquiring minds can do with that
port they scanned at your IP address.

So, when my bank allows me to connect to them over the Internet, this
assumes, among other things such as id and password and account numbers,
that I am using certain specific software, that will follow an expected
procedure, even though that software is built on top of a web browser. And
while elegance can make intelligent clients thinner, it cannot be as 'thin'
as the current web browsers (insert your own 'oxymoron' jokes here). As more
companies 'outsource' or subscribe to apps on tap, and results matter more
than logos and buzzwords, complex and cumbersome should give way to elegant,
powerful, and nimble. Client-server suffered from problems of distributing
binaries to clients (among other issues), and smarter clients and servers do
a better job of negotiating their respective version.

But I do not think that businesses will care to use software that anyone
with a browser (or the like), an IP address, and a port number, can connect
to from most anywhere on the Internet. There is still a need for application
security. While most of us may wind up invisibly behind the scenes on the
server side somewhere, someone has to get the client right. QCTerm could be
foundational to such an approach; at least I think so enough to wish that
AICS Research were a public company (who knows Wirt well enough to talk to
him about an IPO?). If I understand it, it allows developers to build
additional intelligence on its foundation, on both client and host...

Greg Stigers
http://www.cgiusa.com