[dilap]

Re clear code, to my mind it comes out pretty much the same regardless of serialization† format: best approach is to have protocol be written down in some real language (e.g. flatbufs schema or annotated rust structs or whatever), and codegen for target languages.

My guess is it's easier to write an efficient flatbuffers (or similar) serializer+deserializer than an efficient json serializer+deserializer. And the top-end of performance definitely higher.

So if you're already reaching the point of needing to write your own json deserializers...

(† Unless you're talking about some hand-written bespoke binary format, but that would almost certainly be crazy.)