You nailed why I for one am not impressed/excited by Ruby. If the only language I had/knew before Ruby was say COBOL, Ruby would look like an orgasmic programmi

You nailed why I for one am not impressed/excited by Ruby. If the only language I had/knew before Ruby was say COBOL, Ruby would look like an orgasmic programming utopia. But if you have more experience under your belt, both with other languages, and with readability and long-term maintenance, then Ruby looks much less interesting. Not completely without interest/merits, just much less so.