As an example, 110v American outlet plugs are almost certainly not the most efficient way to power devices and appliances; but, because they are so standard and are good enough, using them massively eases the burden of making, buying and selling powered appliances in the US. Similar story with USB C.
True, and to my point, "popular" isn't necessarily "better".
> because they are so standard and are good enough, using them massively eases the burden of making, buying and selling powered appliances
Yes, but LLMs can do the heavy lifting when analyzing the "better programming languages" for productivity. There will be a bias toward popularity in their training sources, though.
On the other hand, having a bunch of different languages is an advantage. People can pick the best tool for the job, and experiment with new language features.