That's how languages should all work?

While I agree, should be is not is. Also, Javascript is still a widely used and favored language, despite it's flaws.

Sometimes people need to be convinced that there's something better, hence all the articles of "Javascript devs discovering actual typing", as you mentioned. Although it seems like the author already knew there's better (I see Typescript and Rust on their Github), that they were just sharing Gleam.

As for specifically Gleam, I will say it's a very nice language. Very simple to understand (with one minor exception: I personally find the use keyword is a bit odd), strong typing, no collections of mysterious symbols (cough, Haskell), no metaprogramming, no lifetimes, no borrowing, no unclear polymorphism, no pointers, no nonsense. I like it, and am excited to see it grow