>>18
What? Lua may not be as pleasant as Python to write, but it's easier to embed, and the reduced footprint does make a difference in both embedded systems and games, which makes it a natural choice in those environments.
That's their niche, what are you saying they're doing wrong? Should they aim to have people write desktop apps with it (it would suck)? Be embedded in design apps (pointless)?
Even more so with Javascript; its only source of recognition is as the web programming language. Stop focusing on that for a moment, and it dies as "that quirky language with all the buggy browser implementations." It's less inert than it seems.