[mhitza]

We already have things like "use strict", because of backwards compatibility. Following the same idea, we could have something like "use ES2023" or something along those lines. Issue with JavaScript is that browsers have in-flux implementations of new features (as browser parent companies see it fit for their usage), and there's no cohesive point in time release process. I think "living" standards, are part of the reason why the web stack is so jumbled.

But what do I care, whatever mess and complexity arises from these "good enough" implementations is left for the generation after us to deal with :)

[bobthepanda]

In some sense, the messiness of the living standard is also what enables large-scale web archival.

A lot of old code in other languages may be hard or impossible to compile and run without significant work.