I've spent much of my career writing C++, which I consider an even more difficult language to work with than Rust. But even so, it gets used a lot for problems

I've spent much of my career writing C++, which I consider an even more difficult language to work with than Rust. But even so, it gets used a lot for problems where performance or a low memory footprint are more important than developer productivity or memory safety. Rust excites me because programs written in it can have similar memory safety to GC'd languages, but have similar runtime characteristics to C++ programs. I can use it to solve the same problems I previously needed C++ to solve, and also new problems where bullet-proof memory safety is a requirement. I've been a quiet cheerleader for the language for the past 10 years because it's been the only language with community momentum that fits the niche that I care about. But I won't be hurt if some other language with similar runtime and safety characteristics to Rust replaces C++; I'll consider that a win.