Maybe, but isn't it too soon to be mainstream anyway? Until the language and standard libraries hit 1.0, it seems like Zig is for early adopters. Having too many of the wrong kind of users is just going to be frustrating for everyone.

Well maybe we are seeing this the wrong way. Maybe that's exactly the mindshare they want.

People who get angry when they see bad code, so much to call the developers lackeys and monkeys.

And an organization whose code base doesn't have to be on a mainstream server to attract exactly those who agree with this choice.

Marketing and visibility retention will likely be better when people think - hey its the PL that is NOT on github.