It's getting much closer. Most ASM.js demos show C++-compiled-into-Javascript is only half performance of native C++ (and getting faster). That's a difference between 30fps and 60fps if all code was Javascript. WebCL, on the other hand, is almost exactly OpenCL speeds... so for GPU-accelerated apps (depending on whether Javascript or WebCL is your primary bottleneck) you could get almost native performance.

SmallPtGPU, from the testing I did a while ago, seems to be almost the same speed whether run in WebCL via Javascript or OpenCL via C++

Some want to use the same algorithms OpenGL and DirectX does... and those APIs are still for them.

Some do not. A good example is Epic Games who, in 2008, predicted "100% of the rendering code" for Unreal Engine 4 would be programmed directly for the GPUs. The next year they found the cost prohibitive so they kept with DirectX and OpenGL at least for a while longer. Especially for big production houses, if there is a bug or a quirk in the rendering code, it would be nice to be able to fix the problem directly rather than hack in a workaround.

Actually, I look at web browsers as an art platform. It is programmed by a set of open standards which gives any person or organization the tools to build support for the content which is relevant to society. A video game, designed in web standards, could be preserved for centuries by whoever deems it culturally relevant.

For once, we have a gaming platform (besides Linux and BSD) which allows genuine, timeless art. If the W3C, or an industry body like them, creates an equivalent pseudo-native app platform... then great. For now, the web is the best we have.

I am not really sure Valve is intending to compete with the next generation of consoles. To me, Steam Machines seem to be filling the niche left behind by "Media Center Extenders". In other words, using the PC ecosystem to widen the market currently dominated by Rokus and invaded by consoles. It will overlap with consoles, and may even prove them redundant, but I do not see Steam Machines as aimed at consoles.

Some quarters they make a lot of money, other quarters they lose a lot of money; net is pretty near zero over the whole console life-cycle.

Had they not wasted so much money and worked on an open platform, they would have steady profits almost the entire time.

(2) Seems to be the theme of the last two generations.

Not only that, but that is roughly 2000$ of license fees (~$10/game + 50$/yr * 10 years + "tons of peripherals and crap" which I'll conservatively say is $500) that you did not need to pay if you didn't game on a console.

And once your consoles break and are out of support... all that money has nothing to run on.

Not only is it not profitable for Microsoft and Sony... but customers, like you, who overpaid for disposable content.