I read "it's popular because it's friendlier". PHP, Javascript or R are popular, but are not friendlier. I find their error messages way worse for the beginner, when you need it more. Third party code is too "clever" for the beginner to read and learn, because it seems to be two languages: the one you are learning in the tutorials, and the other idiom that is used in the serious libraries. As a beginner you are hit with this feeling that you are far, far away from writting an useful thing.
In my job I've seen some beginners starting with R, and quickly hating it because they don't feel they can do much on their own, but copy-pasting and then modifying from the examples and the tutorials. And it the changes go too far, everything collapses with cryptic errors. When you show them Python as an alternative, pointing that they shouldn't use it over R for statistics and graphics, they like that they can build ideas from the scratch. That beginner is hooked for life.
In my job I've seen some beginners starting with R, and quickly hating it because they don't feel they can do much on their own, but copy-pasting and then modifying from the examples and the tutorials. And it the changes go too far, everything collapses with cryptic errors. When you show them Python as an alternative, pointing that they shouldn't use it over R for statistics and graphics, they like that they can build ideas from the scratch. That beginner is hooked for life.