Oh FFS.
Look, if you give the overwhelming majority of people this: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/5pcs-lot-ESP8266-Wifi-Chip-w...
They aren't going to make anything.
If you give them this: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1PCS-ESP-12F-ESP-12E-upgrade...
They are going to have a bad day because it doesn't have a programmer built onto it.
If you give somebody this:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/WEMOS-D1-mini-Pro-16M-bytes-...
They are going to install the arduino IDE, hook it to a USB cable, and make something.
Are you technically pedantically and absolutely pointlessly correct that the ESP8266 chip is the important part of this to SOME people? Yes. But the people who are taking a bare chip in a freaking QFN package and building something around it, who have the equipment to mount it to a board, are not reading "$20 DIY cat feeder" articles, nor would they be in any way confused by somebody telling somebody to buy a prototyping board in an arduino-form-factor.
Your "point" here is one that is completely irrelevant to anybody who would be reading it.