> I would argue that python's popularity comes with numpy/pandas, jupyter notebooks, and the recent popularity of AI/ML/data science. Python was hugely popular

> I would argue that python's popularity comes with numpy/pandas, jupyter notebooks, and the recent popularity of AI/ML/data science. Python was hugely popular long before these were a thing. It was already seen as one of if not the most beginner friendly language at the beginning of the 2000s. It became the language of choice for ML because it was already popular with beginners not the other way round.