Well then obviously you'd want someone who can deal with C. "DeepDuh" indeed. But you're talking hypotheticals - I can do that too: if you suddenly need big da

Well then obviously you'd want someone who can deal with C. "DeepDuh" indeed. But you're talking hypotheticals - I can do that too: if you suddenly need big data then "Oops", you're going to want someone who knows Hadoop or Erlang. If you need to launch a rocket then "Oops" you're going to want an aerospace engineer. But if you're looking for a web dev, then C/Hadoop/Erlang/Aerospace questions are largely a waste of time, and might disqualify candidates who are otherwise fine or who could figure out C given a couple of days. Bear in mind that the original topic is talking about languages for learning how to program, not languages for iOS development. If iOS apps float the beginner's boat then by all means learn Objective C; their enthusiasm for the field will probably overcome their frustration with C. But I suspect they'd be better off learning Python or similar first, then starting on C. Hence my original response: it depends. Python is a pretty good choice because it can do well in lots of different fields and is easy to pick up.