The 10mb of JS is an interesting but misplaced example. There are situations where it's worth the effort to write something with a smaller footprint from scratc

The 10mb of JS is an interesting but misplaced example. There are situations where it's worth the effort to write something with a smaller footprint from scratch but it always comes down to individual incentives. Will it ship faster if we just import this overpowered library? Will additional bloat to our webapp effect the bottom line in any discernible way? The answer to those questions is so frequently yes and no respectively that the emergent result is what you see in your browser's network tab. The user won't shed a tear if it's removed, but they won't leave and spend their money elsewhere in all but the most pathological cases. I think the state of webdev is the result of a common and general problem, micro optimal decisions result in frustrating macro structural issues. But then again if you've found cases where you can build a business off of serving users 10 fewer mb of JS than a competitor, more power to you. Be the change.