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So much in this thread suggests that influence will be exerted to permanently weld wasm's semantics to Javascript's from day one, so that there will never be a viable compile target that isn't just Javascript. In that case, wasm will be nothing but a Coffeescript-like facade over Javascript semantics, and anyone targeting wasm is really only writing Javascript in an inefficient way, and Javascript is the only first-class language, forever.

If wasm is already intended to be crippled relative to Javascript, it really throws into question why wasm should exist at all. When the response to eventually implementing Javascript on top of browser wasm support is "dream on," like because Javascript on top of wasm will suck because it leaves too much performance on the table, that raises the question of why we think building on top of wasm will be acceptable for languages other than Javascript. If building on top of wasm is unacceptable for Javascript, why isn't it unacceptable for everyone else?

Maybe this also throws into question whether any discussions supposedly shaping the development of a new cross-vendor standard are really in good faith, if the reality will be that nothing new is made other than a new spelling of Javascript, and that wasm will be forever steered by Javascript and incapable of meaningfully hosting an implementation of Javascript because it has been intentionally crippled to require an implementation of Javascript.

Anyone who wants wasm to become a real thing has to be cautious that it is not crippled in order to prevent it from being capable of replacing Javascript (whether it actually does replace Javascript is another issue which can really only be asked if we assume wasm is not already sabotaged to be incapable of that).




Or the relevant stakeholders might actually believe in good faith that having one VM in the platform is better than two.




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