The project got a lot of attention at launch, but it wasn't really ready to be used back then. There were too many limitations, like u24 numbers (yes), 2 GB memory limit, pervasive strictness (if-then-else executed both branches). It was just not practical.I think (hope) that explains a lot of it. But honestly there is also my own failure into making the language actually be used, rather than just a viral moment :( I hope it will be different this time!

victor has courted a very llm-enjoyer audience and such people are famously prone to hype (which is kinda brutal in its own way cause the language itself is cool and i dont wanna make it sound like im taking away from that). but yeah, fan activity as you put it easily accounts for the missing order of magnitude, if you like.

This obsession over GitHub stars is quite bizarre.