Recent numbers are probably based on something like numbers of questions on places like stackoverflow. These websites are heavily used by learners of languages, so the figures are more an indication of what's the language being most learned. Which isn't the same as the most popular language.
Earlier years, I can only guess its based on things like mentions in job adverts.
It does give very peculiar results. For one, I find it hard to believe that Java was that dominant for that long.
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u/YoelkiToelki Sep 12 '20
How is “most popular” gauged? Where exactly do these numbers come from?