What I am confused about is that if it has all these problems, how come it has risen to one of the most popular languages (http://www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/) jumping 34 positions since 2015.

Rust on the other hand was voted the most beloved language http://stackoverflow.com/research/developer-survey-2016#technology-most-loved-dreaded-and-wanted . And everyone seems to be saying it's much better then go.

Now obviously they aren't the same language and will be used for the same things, however from my understanding, they CAN be used to achieve similar things.

So basically, if I wanted to build tools/optimizations for web applications (not the whole application it's self) e.g. microservices, custom parsing libraries etc, which one would be best going forward?

Taking into account:

1. Community (e.g. available packages, friendliness)

2. Growth (e.g. how much either is growing)

3. Future outlook (e.g. bust out your crystal balls)

4. Productivity

5. Developer happiness (e.g. who wants to be miserable)