[eksith]

Yahoo Blog on users with JS disabled (stats as of 2010):

http://developer.yahoo.com/blogs/ydn/many-users-javascript-d...

For clients in the UK, it's a legal thing:

https://www.gov.uk/definition-of-disability-under-equality-a...

http://www.rnib.org.uk/professionals/webaccessibility/lawsan...

FYI: Screen readers nowadays can run JS, but there are hiccups abound. Also I don't recall seeing "never do this", though I did see this: "JavaScript isn't evil by any means, and it's really important for creating cool shit, but it should never be required" from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6176036 . Which, in context of the article, seems pretty reasonable to me.

This all started with when kintamanimatt mentioned that the article's technique breaks Progressive Enhancement, "JavaScript is useful, but nobody should assume it's present."

Obviously, I'll need to get an Xbox to play an Xbox game. I'll need Flash enabled on the browser to play a game built on that. Same goes for JS. But, again, the OP makes no mention of "applications" or "web sites" so I'm not sure why you're bringing up "the latest interactive experiences or web-based gaming" into this.

[z92]

The Yahoo link says JavaScript was disabled on 1% of visitors as of 2010.

That percent should be even lower now instead of being higher.

[lucisferre]

Honestly this is getting completely absurd so I'll try to be brief

1. You're article actually states how small this is so point taken I guess

2. 99% of screen readers today actually support javascript [1] and as I stated, if you want to talk hiccups effectively supporting the visually impaired is a veritable minefield of challenges and just supporting javascript being disabled isn't even the tip of the iceberg.

3. Finally just this: Also I don't recall seeing "never do this", though I did see this: "JavaScript isn't evil by any means, and it's really important for creating cool shit, but it should never be required". Just read it back slowly, you'll find the word "never" in there if you're more careful.

You are also choosing to presume incompetence of these issues on the part of the author where I see none demonstrated. Even he bothered to explain his, fairly common these days, use case (JSON response processed on the client with javascript). If you want to argue against this sort of thing be my guest, but you're not really going to reverse the trend. Either way it isn't a debate I'm very interested in.

Reductio ad absurdum as they say.

[1]: http://www.punkchip.com/2011/03/why-support-javascript-disab...