I think it does slow down progress enough to be worth considering because it's clunky but more importantly because it's ancient so there is almost no ability to

I think it does slow down progress enough to be worth considering because it's clunky but more importantly because it's ancient so there is almost no ability to extract metadata or properly target anything other than print as a first class target. In teaching for example I think a book of basically just symbols is dated, we should be trying richer ways to display textbooks (e.g. beyond mere hypertext), using information either annotated or extracted from the source. This isn't about figures but rather making it more productive to use in general, and making its use more semantically analysable, and more deterministic: If you include data in a paper is it actually up to date? Does that expression actually solve the equation etc. These are all things you could check automatically. There are obviously bigger problems in science but what are you gonna do about them? It's nearly all political either in the department's or in government, whereas a new LaTeX is a relatively direct thing that can be done with a small team and a lot of money.