alt Hacker NewsThe Faster Python project would’ve got further if Microsoft hadn’t let the entire team go when they made large numbers of their programming languages teams redundant last year. All in the name of “AI”. Microsoft basically gave up on core computer science to go chase the hype wave.
You’re right, of course: even Guido seems to have been moved off working on CPython and onto some tangentially-related AI technology.
However, Faster CPython was supposed be a 4-year project, delivering a 1.5x speedup each year. AFAIK they had the full 4 years at Microsoft, and only achieved what they originally planned to do in 1 year.