Yes, and whose advertisements do you think show up in every single one of those magazines? Which implementations get mentioned by every single C++ book? Which organization sponsored every single C++ conference? Don’t forget that they had stiff competition from the advertising budgets of other large companies, such as Oracle and IBM.
Also, don’t forget that Lisp machines were once the most coveted development machines on the market. But Symbolics had to develop not only the language and IDE, but also the OS, the hardware, the microcode, and everything else all at once. It’s pretty telling that they soon began running Unix (on a separate processor) and then their next product was an add–in card for an Apple Macintosh II containing a Lisp processor ASIC. By then the C++ hype train was gathering steam and the AI winter had begun. Symbolics didn’t survive, and their direct competitor LMI had even less chance. So it’s not that Lisp offers no advantages, it’s just that market conditions killed off the companies that were offering it. Note that these market conditions were created by advertising and shifting public perception.
I thus return to my thesis, which is that the market success of a language has little, if anything, to do with the advantages of the language. Instead marketing and advertising rule the day.
> But Symbolics had to develop not only the language and IDE, but also the OS, the hardware, the microcode, and everything else all at once
This was forty years ago. Doing LISP advocacy like this just makes people sound like they're that Japanese guy who refused to surrender until the 1970s. The world has moved on; there have been other opportunities; and LISP has not won them either.
The timeframe doesn’t matter. What matters is that C++ triumphed not because it was a better language, but because it was sold better. It had better advertising.
Also, don’t forget that Lisp machines were once the most coveted development machines on the market. But Symbolics had to develop not only the language and IDE, but also the OS, the hardware, the microcode, and everything else all at once. It’s pretty telling that they soon began running Unix (on a separate processor) and then their next product was an add–in card for an Apple Macintosh II containing a Lisp processor ASIC. By then the C++ hype train was gathering steam and the AI winter had begun. Symbolics didn’t survive, and their direct competitor LMI had even less chance. So it’s not that Lisp offers no advantages, it’s just that market conditions killed off the companies that were offering it. Note that these market conditions were created by advertising and shifting public perception.
I thus return to my thesis, which is that the market success of a language has little, if anything, to do with the advantages of the language. Instead marketing and advertising rule the day.