It's not - it's getting harder to build worthwhile ones.

The barrier to entry is higher, the expectations on the size of the standard library are higher, the expected quality of tools is higher.

Everything in your second sentence is true, but it seems like LLVM has been a huge boost. I think a lot more programmers are comfortable with parsing and ASTs than they are with the x86 instruction set. Not having to write IL->CPU codegen or peephole optimizations significantly lowers barrier for entry to compiled PL development.

(I say this as just an observer, having written interpreters but no compiled languages.)

But it's getting easier to just implement a language at all. That might be all you need to hit HN. No one said anything about "worthwhile" ones.

That says a lot more about HN than about anything else...

It says that we look for more in an idea than pure utility, that cleverness and beauty also count. That's a good thing.

> That's a good thing.

Maybe, maybe not, but luckily that question's not very important. Here's what is:

Where is the cleverness and beauty in Yet Another Boring LLVM Frontend(tm)? Zig and Rust are more than that, I'll readily grant - but that description does fall under the umbrella of "implementing a language".