> It was only later with the emergence of web applications that it became clear the browser itself would become the universal client and actually be a platform in it's own right.
Outside of e-mail, the non-browser Internet applications were on their way out by the mid-90s. Mosaic put the first nail in their coffin and then Navigator hammered in a few more.
Graphical web browsing was just a richer experience than what Gopher offered. Netscape's support for Gopher, and like FTP, just made it a web-like experience. WAIS was essentially dead by the mid-90s.
Navigator obviated the need for myriad applications to access a bunch of different servers. It didn't help that as graphical browsers were gaining traction UMN decided to charge license fees for their gopher implementation while several early web servers were FOSS or at least freely licensed.
In 1995 if you wanted to start some Internet service there was no reason to do so on Gopher, WAIS, or some bespoke protocol. The web covered those services' capabilities and added a lot more, especially with HTTP 1.1. So I'd content the browser as a universal client for Internet services was pretty evident soon after Mosaic's release and a foregone conclusion with the release of Navigator.
Gopher was more widely used that WWW until 1994, and it was a basic install on most Internet nodes in the first few years of 90's. The point of Gopher was it was one of the first widely deployed protocols that allowed you to find things, like a Mosiac Browser to download. It died quickly but was an important stepping stone.
In 1990 IRC had average of 12 users :) (but other chat programs were used before IRC) . True FTP, other chats, MUDs, email, etc. were widely used/available.
I was reading a lot in the newsgroups starting in 1992 and saw a steady increase in http URLs being included in posts, and IIRC there was never a time when the frequency of gopher URLs exceeded that of http ones.
Note that the web is older than Gopherspace with the first gopher site appearing in mid-1991.
While looking up that last fact, I see that there was heavy interest in gopher by colleges and universities. Maybe our experiences differ because you were in college then?
Outside of e-mail, the non-browser Internet applications were on their way out by the mid-90s. Mosaic put the first nail in their coffin and then Navigator hammered in a few more.
Graphical web browsing was just a richer experience than what Gopher offered. Netscape's support for Gopher, and like FTP, just made it a web-like experience. WAIS was essentially dead by the mid-90s.
Navigator obviated the need for myriad applications to access a bunch of different servers. It didn't help that as graphical browsers were gaining traction UMN decided to charge license fees for their gopher implementation while several early web servers were FOSS or at least freely licensed.
In 1995 if you wanted to start some Internet service there was no reason to do so on Gopher, WAIS, or some bespoke protocol. The web covered those services' capabilities and added a lot more, especially with HTTP 1.1. So I'd content the browser as a universal client for Internet services was pretty evident soon after Mosaic's release and a foregone conclusion with the release of Navigator.