I think you’re overstating a good bit.
Elixir doesn’t see the same adoption as Java, .NET, Go and Python because:
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Java App Servers have long provided a tremendous amount of tooling that was not available in other languages for almost a decade. K8s and Docker gives a more general purpose version of what these were giving since pre 2000. Once a company invested in that Java infrastructure adding in any new language was not a simple decision because it wasn’t a matter of using language X here, language X also missed the deployment tooling, logging, variable abstraction, clustering, zero downtime deployments, etc. When the JVM opened up to other languages and the development experience improved it became even more entrenched because now you could run lots of other languages on that same infrastructure investment.
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.NET gained traction from Windows itself, Microsoft certifications, SQL Server, etc and the cross promotion arm of Microsoft that gives you huge technology deals based on how many MS Certified employees you have. This becomes a self-feeding beast that the longer you’re in, the more invested you become in staying in so pivoting is hard.
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Go got an uptick because of portability (like java), single binary deployment (easy to run anywhere), better concurrency than 1 & 2 and designed for an extremely low learning curve (protection from turnover…but the “is this it?” experience), along with the backing of Google. Not to say that Go isn’t without other benefits, but those were the selling points that made it easier to introduce in big corps.
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Python has continued to be the general purpose language that’s just everywhere. Use it for web apps with Django, server admin, it shipped with linux, admin tooling like Ansible was built with it, easy call outs to C that have led to adoption for advanced math and data science. It’s everywhere and the increase in its use as a teaching language only advanced it further.
These are the very real forces at work pushing languages 1-4 and any language (Elixir or otherwise) is fighting the same uphill battle for entrenchment in the enterprise world. I don’t see Elixir ever becoming an enterprise type language because of that. If it does happen it will be a decade long journey. It will gain attention as more and more startups use it as a disrupting force.
But just like Ruby, one of the biggest obstacles to greater adoption numbers is that one person can do SOOOOO much with the language that you don’t need huge teams.
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