Comment by msla

The problem with Go is that it's single-source. That used to be death, single-source; couldn't get contracts if you were the only one providing a technology. C is multiple-source; even if you limit yourself to modern OSS compilers there's GCC and Clang, each from an independent group.

The trend towards unstandardized languages that only exist as a single blessed implementation, as opposed to languages defined by an official standards document with multiple implementations that are all on the same footing, is definitely an artifact of the Internet era: You don't "need" a standard if everyone can get an implementation from the same development team, for some definition of "need" I suppose.

If your horizon is only 20 years, Go is likely reasonable. Google will probably still exist and not be an Oracle subsidiary or anything similarly nasty in that period. OTOH, you might have said the same thing about staid, stable old AT&T in 1981...