I'm sure there are lots of smart people who found that the language didn't suit their needs. there are also lots of smart people who love using Julia. both things can be true at the same time.
There are some real issues in the ecosystem. Specifically there is a high proportion of “gradware” because much like other scientific languages there is a high proportion of graduate students doing their projects and then moving on.
The language also encourages relying on packages which can break. But juliaup makes this easy enough to solve by downgrading.
It’s true that MIT and a few other organizations have more influence than others simply because they employ more developers with time/scope to work on the language. Just like every programming language.
But this becomes less true all the time. And most of the direction that is “paid for” is an unadulterated good: JuliaC ahead of time compilation has been requested for over a decade and has made enormous progress.
I think you misunderstood my sentiment. That's okay. In a few years you'll probably be where I am now. Setting a reminder for 2 years.