I've been following Rust since way before 1.0 and one of my fears when 1.0 was announced was that it seemed rushed. On the other hand, I completely understood the need for stabilization for people that actually use Rust in production (i.e. not me).

People aren't building castles on foundations of sand. They are building sandcastles, experimenting and building along as the language and ecosystem evolves and matures. Every nightly-only crate should be regarded as highly unstable and experimental. If a lot of people are building sandcastles surely that means that the language wasn't yet ready for that particular castle being made of stone.

And this is a good thing! AFAICT without nightly-only crates being so pervasive due to compiler plugins, Macros 1.1 wouldn't be so close to stabilization. Isn't that exactly what nightly is for? If some nightly feature is used a lot, that means it should promptly be polished and stabilized.

At such an early stage in the language's life the evolution is mutual. The development team responding timely to such issues is just another sign that Rust is a healthy (even if in its infancy) language.

Stable Rust is dead, long live Stable Rust!