I think people were not ready to switch from some heavy established software. Also by that time, costless was seen as less qualitative (certainly because organi

I think people were not ready to switch from some heavy established software. Also by that time, costless was seen as less qualitative (certainly because organisations are happy with licences and are always looking for support contract ?) Coming later, when the market(?) is ready, made R more successful. I think people used to compare to established standard and detractors are always there to point out missing stuffs, giving impression that Octave or Scilab are behind. Coming with a radical different language, R was condemned to quickly succeed or perish, and anyway avoid direct and frontal comparisons.