> Emacs is dead, except for a relatively small group of persons who were exposed to it very early in their careers This is false. There are plenty of new users

> Emacs is dead, except for a relatively small group of persons who were exposed to it very early in their careers This is false. There are plenty of new users. https://emacssurvey.org/2020/ https://emacssurvey.org/2020/ Emacs is not now or in the future ever going to have "mass appeal" and that's okay. It caters to a niche, intellectually curious developers who like tinkering for its own sake. If programming is just a job to you, that's totally fine. For a lot folks, programming is like accounting, a safe path to a decent paycheck. These folks will likely use VS Code and that's OK. Not every piece of software needs to "eat the world". Some software, like Emacs, can just be enjoyed by a community of dedicated users.