I think the perspective is skewed, because who are websites for? Not the developers, that's for sure. It's for the users, and if the users think that Safari is better, than there might be a reason for this madness, and the other browsers should adjust their goals.

I'm a developer myself, and did webdevelopment professionally for 7 years until I switched paths 3 years ago. I know all about supporting multiple browsers and what not. But the thing is, Chrome just doesn't feel and look elegant and smooth like Safari does. The same with Firefox. That's why I use Safari 99% of the time.

There's a balance between functionality and design, and chrome seems more skewed towards functionality, and Safari towards design. When this is so, and Safari does all I need better than chrome 99% of the time, I naturally choose safari.

...and yes, Safari should be more standard compliant, I'm not disagreeing with you on those points.