nope , you are close but you got it the other way around. As a smalltalker you see it from purist way of view. For you Python is that language that got caught up on too reliance on C/C++ libraries.

What you see as side effect is actually the central goal of python. The central goal of python was and still is to a great extend today to serve as scripting language for C and C++ code. This what made python so successful that a C/C++ coder could use on top of its app embedded inside its app. ��This why so many people use it even today.��

You also again wrong to assume that its a late thing that new VMs are developed for Python , PyPy which is very well known inside the python community has been around more than 12 years. Its a very performant JIT VM 2-10 faster than cpython. Why cpython has not ported to it ? because of not so good support for C/C++ , zero support for cpython libraries and of course because as they say it would complicate the development of cpython quite a lot . Its that situation that only a couple of people can decypher the magic of the VM and the rest of developer only hope for the best.��

And PyPy is not the only JIT VM for python , there is also Jython that runs of JVM and ironpython that runs on .NET and Mono. What those 3 have in common ?that are used by a tiny crowd compared to people using cpython.

The truth is pure python libraries are a rarity . Why you think the most popular , by far, implementation of python is called cpython ? I will give you a hint, 50% of its source code is written in C. No thats not just the VM its libraries and cpython comes with a lot of libraries included.��

Frankly I dont believe that any VM ever however fast will ever beat smooth integration of C/C++ code unless you have a huge company to back you up with an insane amount of libraries. �� Java had Sun , .NET has still Microsoft.

For people that speed is a serious matter even if a VM is a mere 30% slower than optimised C code, they will take the C code any day. ��