Why is Python popular, while Lisp and Scheme aren't?

[Dennis Lee Bieber]

Alexander Schmolck fed this fish to the penguins on Wednesday 20 
November 2002 04:40 pm:

> macros would make it feasible to write extremely readable code (even

        Forgive my intrusion but...

        Macros have always seemed to me to be a means of implementing 
work-arounds for what a language lacks in its native definition. 
Granted, the only languages I've been exposed to with macros are the C 
family, and meta-symbol (Xerox Sigma high-end assembler -- out of 
boredom one day I scribbled out the macro definitions to create an 
Intel 8080 absolute assembler in it).

        Macros in LISP may make it possible to write "extremely readable code" 
-- but what level of LISP expertise is required to write those macros?

        If you have to supply the macros ahead of time, the users aren't 
learning LISP, they are learning "MacroExtendedLISP"...

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