But can you get the full org experience without emacs? I love the principles of org mode, but it seems to be too dependent on a particular editor. For it to be universal it should be 100% un-tied to emacs. As in, the most popular org mode tutorial should not mention emacs at all. So far this does not yet seem feasible.

EDIT: to clarify, there's nothing wrong with emacs. But if Org mode is tied to it, you cannot help interpreting promotion of Org as promotion of emacs. Which is alright, but it feels a bit sneaky. Just be upfront about it: promote emacs (plus some packages).