> It is impossible to create modern web apps with all of the functionality
users nowadays expect without using javascript (or a similar language that
would raise the same concerns).
I have seen this claim time and time again, and never once has anyone
provided any example of a needed JavaScript functionality for websites. I'm
sorry, things like Google Docs don't count. Those shouldn't be embedded onto
Web pages. The user should be downloading them, saving them, and running them
like any other program on their computer. Even in the case of something like
Diaspora, it should be a client program no different in principle from an
email client, and any Web-based interface should be minimal and usable
without JavaScript. If client-side JavaScript is required for something,
don't include it. Put it in the client program.
> Everybody who argues against that is somehow stuck in the nineties.
I never used the Web in the nineties and JavaScript was always, to my
knowledge, a part of my experience on the Web. This here is nothing more than
an appeal to novelty, anyway. A bad design is a bad design, regardless of how
new or old it is.
> This issue could be solved by the browser.
It could be, but it hasn't been. Would you like to do the legwork? My article
also outlines what a browser would need to do to make libre JavaScript code
on the Web acceptable. A simple Firefox extension should do the trick.