And I agree with you too. There is a place for apps. But it is annoying how every site these days seems to want you to download their app. No thanks, I am just browsing the web, I don't want to commit to a relationship yet !

Another benefit is content that is available offline, on the go. Without having to access internet, imagine your users could down all your content while on a flight? This is all assuming a website worth reading whether online or offline.

I don't believe thats within the capability of "hosted apps". This would be true of only hybrid (Cordova) & native apps.

There is the HTML5 Offline APIs for that. If you have an offline-capable web app, I think it should be possible for a tool like ManifoldJS to find out all of the assets it requires and package them into the app. Whether it actually does this, I don't know.

HTML5 Offline storage can be used without an app. Part of the issue is not the storage, but how to run the app in the background to pre-fetch the content. Here's a table showing the limited access that hosted apps have. Looks like they do have access to certain device storage APIs, as well as desktop notifications, microphone, etc. https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/Apps/Build/App_permissio... Here's another page comparing "packaged" to "hosted" apps which seems to imply they are mutually exclusive - https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/Marketplace/Options/Pack...