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No. Popularity does not indicate quality. Judging the quality of something by its popularity is a form of cyclical reasoning. Especially when there is an obviou
by anoncake 5y ago
No. Popularity does not indicate quality. Judging the quality of something by its popularity is a form of cyclical reasoning. Especially when there is an obvious alternative explanation, namely that JS is the only language you can in the browser without transpiling and for a long time the only one period.
While the fact JS can be used to build all these things puts a floor on its quality, that floor is uselessly low.
- blowski 5y agoI'm not using popularity as the metric. "1 million identical websites were built with JavaScript" wouldn't say much beyond the first website. But that there is a very broad range of successful applications partly relying on JavaScript for their success undercuts the idea that JavaScript is inherently rubbish. Whether it has some subjective "quality" is a conversation best left for art galleries.
- anoncake 5y agoIf you say JS is "pretty good" how is that not a statement about its quality?
- blowski 5y agoFair point. I guess I could rephrase it as "JavaScript provides a lot of value".
- joelfolksy 5y ago"The proof that JS is actually pretty good is that it has been used to build so many things." [French Narrator] 5 minutes later... "I'm not using popularity as the metric."