1) raising the bar for the people you need to hire is a good thing. If you think that settling for mediocre engineers is ok, then you're doing it wrong
2) We've already have ~20 engineers writing scala code at foursquare. Not 50 yet, but the challenge of getting there will having nothing to do with our choice of language. If anything it's helped with hiring so far.
3) I did tell our VCs that we'll be using scala. They didn't have a problem with it. In fact a VC on our board agreed with me that "using cutting edge technology can give a real edge in recruiting."
Basically my experience growing the engineering team at foursquare has been the exact opposite of your claims.
2) We've already have ~20 engineers writing scala code at foursquare. Not 50 yet, but the challenge of getting there will having nothing to do with our choice of language. If anything it's helped with hiring so far.
3) I did tell our VCs that we'll be using scala. They didn't have a problem with it. In fact a VC on our board agreed with me that "using cutting edge technology can give a real edge in recruiting."
Basically my experience growing the engineering team at foursquare has been the exact opposite of your claims.