We now have people saying that COBOL is an old programming language ... threatening global stability.
The threat to global stability comes not from a language but from shortsightedness in public and private industry. The article claims that there are 220 billion lines of COBOL in active service globally. The number of trained programmers, by contrast, is dwindling rapidly.
It's not the fault of the language that we are now in this situation. It's the fault of people, people who are far too interesting in bowing down to the god of the new; people who suffer from kainomania and who have made kainomania an industry standard (I can't find Steve Jobs's little soundbite now, but to loud cheering he says, "Completely new!".)
Interestingly, the headline of the article acts against the intent of the text, which ends on quite a positive note, viz, "If you've ever wanted to learn COBOL, now would be the perfect time to do so."
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