That was when we had no choice but to force in hacks to make things work on browsers that didn't quite follow the same standards. You ended up only being able t

That was when we had no choice but to force in hacks to make things work on browsers that didn't quite follow the same standards. You ended up only being able to use the lowest common denominator feature set or using many hacks & polyfills. Better is to stick with standards and make the browser makers implement them properly. Of course things aren't perfect still (Safari has a reputation for being slow on the uptake so you can't use the latest & greatest if you need to support those users, and it is best to avoid the bleeding edge anyway (at least sticking as far back as the oldest LTS release of common browsers)).