PHP "was" a great motivation for someone starting out. It is far more understandable for non technical people and gets results witch fuel your motivation further. The above qualities "were very important" in a time where self learning material were rare, incomplete and expensive. I remember myself as a self taught back in 2006 that PHP gave me inner strength. For me this is the reason for PHP being popular back then.
But now things have changed. Self learning materials (MOOCs etc) are everywhere and in great format (videos, classes etc), so it is far easier to grasp harder and more complicated therefore more sophisticated topics and tools and be productive to fuel your motivation. Also things have changed, people have realized that web is not all there is in programming due to the rise of higher added value programming activities such as games, mobile apps, data science etc. So for me this is the reason PHP is not so popular nowadays. Many other languages support the above in expense of being more complex (for example python or java) but self learning materials nowadays make this problem obsolete.
TL;DR: IMHO the "only pragmatic problem" with php, which is also its great strength, is that its domain is mainly the the web. So in order to reach other cs areas which are of higher added value nowadays (eg algorithms, data, mobile, you name it..) you must switch tools.
But now things have changed. Self learning materials (MOOCs etc) are everywhere and in great format (videos, classes etc), so it is far easier to grasp harder and more complicated therefore more sophisticated topics and tools and be productive to fuel your motivation. Also things have changed, people have realized that web is not all there is in programming due to the rise of higher added value programming activities such as games, mobile apps, data science etc. So for me this is the reason PHP is not so popular nowadays. Many other languages support the above in expense of being more complex (for example python or java) but self learning materials nowadays make this problem obsolete.
TL;DR: IMHO the "only pragmatic problem" with php, which is also its great strength, is that its domain is mainly the the web. So in order to reach other cs areas which are of higher added value nowadays (eg algorithms, data, mobile, you name it..) you must switch tools.