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Compared to scripts within a page, what extra powers do addons/extensions have? They are essentially scripts, then what makes them so special? Beside being static, have buttons on the toolbar, and be able to see the locations of other tabs, what extra functionalities do they provide over scripts on a page?
Scripts on a website are generally sandboxed and are limited in what they can do (for security). In contrast, extensions can live outside of the sandbox and interact more with the browser and system. For example, some extensions can manipulate browser history, browser preferences, intercept and modify pages, access your clipboard, or even execute arbitrary code on the system. Taking a look at the Chrome extensions permissions warnings can give you a pretty good idea of what Chrome extensions can do (and which most scripts can’t). Also check out the chrome.* APIs which extensions have access to.