I recently did exactly this and it wasn't that bad. It's not that I couldn't use Backbone, I decided not to because I didn't see the point in introducing yet another library when all I really needed to do was bind inputs to a model, which I did in about 5 lines of terse jQuery. Besides, I had custom widgets that wouldn't have benefited from Backbone anyway and would have required customization anyway. I think judicious use of libraries is ok, but tbe more elite among us tend to become libray snobs and shame people for not doing things the "right" way.