"Also, I think people want to attract others to their tool of choice due to the positive network externalities involved." This is huge point. I've wasted so mu

"Also, I think people want to attract others to their tool of choice due to the positive network externalities involved." This is huge point. I've wasted so much time in my life fighting about what technology to use on a project- with people that aren't actually going to be writing any code on the project. Why do people care SO MUCH about what technology is used on project- even when it's a project they are NOT ON? Positive network externalities sums it up pretty well. The crazy thing programming is that it defines people's mental models around problems. The common chestnut of Java programmers using iterative techniques in SQL stored procedures, as opposed to set based operations is borne out in reality. The different mental models associated with different languages make it hard to switch too often.