Java was irrelevant by then, shockwave was not really used for websites, that would be Flash, which was already installed on most clients and was working fine.

Java was irrelevant by then, shockwave was not really used for websites, that would be Flash, which was already installed on most clients and was working fine. Flash was not shitty, it was quite good for writing apps, but it was proprietary and like a lot of contemporary tech it was (becoming) a security liability. You're giving waaay too much credit to JS. Apple almost single-handedly buried Flash.