[ChrisArchitect]

How much traffic do you think the 404 page gets? or do any 404 pages get these days? With a clean sitemap and only linked pages indexed on search engines, very few actual users/customers are going to hit 404 pages these days.

This isn't about being performative. This is about having fun. Blame a thousand Web 2.0 companies from yesteryear or blame Google for their legacy of little jokey easter eggs. This has a nod to Slack's history and some devs got to blow off some steam and have some fun. Would it be better if they crammed the animation into 1kb? Sure, but this isn't a demoscene comp. And perhaps Marketing gets a positive bump for it when someone shares it saying this is cool (or conversely threads like this).

This is about having some fun. It's part of our internet roots and culture.