Summary - I

Desktops, mobile devices, and the web have each introduced certain progressions but also some regressions in certain cases. For example, despite the introduction of AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript And XML), websites and web applications still suffer until today due to the limitation of HTML and the browser, which at their foundation were built as a publication platform that morphed into an application platform, albeit a weak one.
Now that we have been exposed to many different devices with many different platforms, it is possible, if not necessary, to establish some best-practices regarding navigation, which is the single most important criteria for usability and Rich User Experience (RUE). The objective is to raise the bar from the low common denominator of a mundane to a rich navigation that offers engaging, immersive, interactive, collaborative, attractive, and even desirable experience that attracts intrigued visitors and convert them into excited users who become paying customers who finally morphed into loyal evangelists.