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I feel like a lot of these can be packaged as an extension for vscode. I'd rather not have multiple different variations of the same ide, too much duplication.

But why? If it weren't based on VSCode you'd be happy with a separate IDE, surely?

Because generally they don't add anything that couldn't have just been a VSCode extension... in which case it would really be better for users if it was a VSCode extension. The only reason they don't do that is for branding & control purposes.

There are exceptions. E.g. Theia actually does enough stuff differently that I think it warrants being its own thing. At least it did. Looks like they have jumped on the AI bandwagon too.

Maybe this is the same; I haven't looked at it in detail. But "we have an IDE! (don't tell them it's vscode)" feels a lot like "we have an app! (don't tell them its a webview)".

I like seeing specialised, bespoke tools existing, that's all.

But in what way? Do they need to implement their own libc as well? At what layer of the software stack does this start to matter?

Libc does not dictate much if anything about the UX of your IDE, so I don't see how that would be relevant.