I have to say I feel a bit old hearing developers say "well why didn't the OS developers provide common APIs for creating applications?" which in my mind, is asking why Toyota Corollas and Ford F-150's don't use the same engine. The answer being they were two entire universes, and still are to a great degree.
That being said, while it is desirable to have standard API endpoints that are accessible, and while standards in general are a Good Thing(tm) to have, it does get a bit tiresome to hear different companies like Spotify[1], especially of that scale, bemoaning that they simply "must" use frameworks like Electron to build their applications because developing for individual platforms is just too expensive. If you want your application available on multiple platforms, and you want it to be a good experience to use, then you should be developing bespoke applications for them. That's just... logic, to me.
Yeah, it's more work. But to take a crap ton of web-content, shove it in a .app file and distribute that is massively wasteful, lazy, and results in what that kind of effort typically nets: bad experiences.
For example: I absolutely LOVE the Atom editor. It's a fantastic tool to use. That said I've had to give it up because it was simply killing my Mac's performance, a brand new, 2019, 15" Macbook Pro would sit there spinning it's fans up whenever it was on the screen, for a text editor. A feature rich text editor to be sure, but this thing can play 4K movies without even running the fans. A text editor should not strain it. I can't help but feel Electron is playing a role here.
[1]: I have no idea if Spotify uses Electron. I just know they've complained about this before.
