Good that GMail is created with GWT. So it doesn't even use JavaScript. Most people are so afraid of JavaScript that they create hella crazy abstractions (Angularjs [Google], ReactJS [Facebook]) and even then Microsoft and Google trying to avoid JavaScript more and more with Typescript or Dart, they transpile it. JavaScript maybe is valuable in the web, but not in it's current form. So much quirks that you either spend using a library or fixing browser incompabilites.
A lot of people here said that transpiling will be used a lot in the upcoming years, and I think that also. People will more and more. They want to use Python/Scala/Java/Whatever on both sides. Also it will reduce complexity by a lot.
Currently your typical webapp has, a server-side technology (even if you are using node), then you have a web frontend which uses at least npm, however mostly you end up with npm, bower, gulp/grunt, webpack and whatever.
> Client-server architectures instead of monoliths
What about small teams? They can't split their monolith since it will become unmanageable. So if they have two apps, frontend/backend it's still a mess to manage these projects with a small team.
> We need to stop excluding JavaScript apps from “the web as it was intended”. JavaScript apps are “of the web”, not just second-class citizens “on the web”.
In my eyes JavaScript should be used where it is needed, but not used in stuff which never should touch it. JavaScript is still a mess.