I think, overall, you're right: the "open" nature of C++ (and C) has been a key factor in their success. ObjC became available in GCC via NeXT (although somewh

I think, overall, you're right: the "open" nature of C++ (and C) has been a key factor in their success. ObjC became available in GCC via NeXT (although somewhat despite NeXT) and so it was more-or-less equally available for many purposes. The language definition was always locked up though, and there was little innovation from Stepstone, NeXT, and later Apple. ObjC++, ARC, GCD, etc, were all useful but more-or-less proprietary. Despite 15 years of being the native language for one of the world's most popular computing platforms, used by millions of developers, ObjC didn't leverage that advantage, and things like GNUstep have continued to have very little impact. RIP Paul Fillinich.