Talking about GitHub numbers, we can look at VLang, which had an astronomical trajectory initially due to overpromising and selling a language that would solve long standing issues such as no manual memory management but no GC needed etc.

Such viral popularity creates a different trajectory from organically growing word of mouth such as in the Odin case.

Vlang also has a Wikipedia page.

Is this then proof that it is a viable alternative to the general public? This is what you argue.

The use of negative catch phrases and envious put downs by competitors of Vlang has no bearing on the Wikipedia process. They will not care about any competition or politics among programming languages. The language either meets their standard and proves its case, that it should have a page, or not. Just like Zig, Nim, Rust, etc... have done.

This idea is what I criticize.

Not to mention that Wikipedia’s notability criteria is increasingly harder to live up to as tech news gets more and more decentralized.

It is not enough for notability that the Odin author is interviewed in various podcasts. It’s not enough for the language to be used in a leading visual effects tool and so on. These are not valid references for Wikipedia.

So how did Vlang achieve it? By commissioning books on the language(!). Once there was a book on V (nevermind no one bought it) it fulfilled the Wikipedia criteria. There are discussions about this on various V forums.

So let go of the idea that Wikipedia is proving anything.

The first book written about V (5 years ago), looks to have been a total surprise to the community and its creator, because it was written in Japanese[1]. The 2nd book written about V has clearly sold well and received very good reviews[2]. It's author had no connection with V development and there are interviews about him. A 3rd book[3], which was for academic circles, is not primarily about V. It, however, uses the programming language for random number generation and explanations on the subject.

The point I'm getting at, is marketing one's self on HN or podcasts as a viable alternative versus being an actual viable alternative used by the general public. It's one thing to act like or say your popular, it's another thing to be popular. There is a qualitative difference, that is even picked up on by Wikipedia, which is arguably why Odin or C3 don't have a page or the numbers on GitHub.

Despite any misdirected anger or envy, that problem has nothing to do with other languages like V or even Zig. It's up to fans and interested third parties of that language to show and report widespread usage.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08BKJDRFR (Book about V (Vlang) in 2020 and in Japanese)

[2] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09FKK3JL7 (Book about V (Vlang) in 2021, highly rated, and sold well)

[3] https://doi.org/10.52305%2FCVCN5241 (Book is part of an academic series, 2023, and uses V (Vlang))

First, "future prospect", is a claim almost any language can try to make. Unless it is a language created by a well known corporation (Carbon for example) or famous programmer (Jai or Mojo), such claims lack a foundation. A new language can really only make the argument of truly being a future prospect, if it comes from something already successful or famous.

Thus, for most newer languages, GitHub is a valid metric. Not just stars, but the number of contributors and activity associated with the repo. Other things like books on Amazon by third parties or articles about the language in well known magazines, would clearly count too. These things are measurables, beyond just hype.