There's no real danger difference. If you implicitly do:

    var self = this;

When you need to use `this`, you just end up proxying the problem behind a variable. If you don't understand what `this` is, it's not going to magically start correcting your misunderstanding.

The only possible value it might have is when nesting functions if you refer to `self` instead of `this` correctly, but this is the only case when I actually use this pattern, and when I first create a nested function that needs to use the parent's scope. Another option is to just `.bind(this)`.

In any case, I would disagree that one should try to avoid `this`. Instead, one should educate themselves to understand what things in the language they're using mean. And this subject is a great weeder question in Web Engineer position interviews. If a person can't implement `bind`, can't explain `call`/`apply`, what strict mode does, and what the `this` keyword means in most contexts, they probably aren't strong enough in JS. This is one of the most fundamental concepts in JS, it shouldn't be a source of confusion.

I understand 'this', that's why I avoid it. All languages have their quirks, and some programmers like to think they're 'smart' by taking advantage of those quirks. Then when you or your team members run into problems you blame the person and not the language, which you're right, but maybe you should of just kept your code simple in the first place.

I'm not sure I understand you.

Dereferencing things that aren't pointers leads to unexpected results in C. Should we avoid dereferencing any variable in C?

I think of `this` in the same way - it behaves normally if you use it the way it's intended to be used. In other words, don't try to read `this` in a callback without binding it first, and you'll be fine.

Or are there other pitfalls I'm unaware of?

Totally, just remember to use var. Dangerous this is much scary then accidentally adding a global variable.

The problem with `self` is that it is already a predefined global variable in the browser pointing to the global object :)

And btw, the `this` situation with javascript is not that bad :) use bind - either the Ecmascript 5 version or shimmed and you will be fine. Not much drama.

Well you might just use some other name than `self` e.g. I use var _this = this;