Worse is better: This can be taken a number of ways. In terms of time (and money), "worse but I can afford it and get it today" beats "better but I can't actu

Worse is better: This can be taken a number of ways. In terms of time (and money), "worse but I can afford it and get it today" beats "better but I can't actually get it". "Worse but easier to use" may also beat "better but harder to use". In terms of writing OSes (which was the use of C), the ability to flip bits and deal with raw memory was very useful. A safer tool might have been "better", but it also could have made it harder to write OSes. The Fran Allen quote seems to be saying that C made all this promising research stop. Bell Labs did not have armed thugs going out pointing guns at peoples' heads. Why did the research stop, if it was so promising? Because the researchers (many, at least) decided it was less promising - or at least, that more promising options were now available. So if C did that, it did it by either showing that previous directions weren't promising, or by opening up better options. Either way, it's rather unfair to mourn the paths that were not pursued and blame C for it.