Python for a hobbyist programmer ( a few questions)

Question

I'm a hobbyist programmer (only in TI-Basic before now), and after much, much, much debating with myself, I've decided to learn Python. I don't have a ton of free time to teach myself a hundred languages and all programming I do will be for personal use or for distributing to people who need them, so I decided that I needed one good, strong language to be good at. My questions:

1. Is python powerful enough to handle most things that a typical programmer might do in his off-time? I have in mind things like complex stat generators based on user input for tabletop games, making small games, automate install processes, and build interactive websites, but probably a hundred things along those lines

2. Does python handle networking tasks fairly well?

3. Can python source be obfuscated, or is it going to be open-source by nature? The reason I ask this is because if I make something cool and distribute it, I don't want some idiot script kiddie to edit his own name in and say he wrote it

4. And how popular is python, compared to other languages. Ideally, my language would be good and useful with help found online without extreme difficulty, but not so common that every idiot with computer knows python. I like the idea of knowing a slightly obscure language.

Thanks a ton for any help you can provide.

Answer 1

Is python powerful enough to handle most things?

Yes. Period. Study EveOnline game for more information. Look at pygame framework. Free free to use Google to find more.

Does python handle networking tasks fairly well?

Yes. Look at the number of Python web frameworks plus the Twisted framework. Feel free to use Google to search for Python networking.

Can python source be obfuscated?

Not usefully. This isn't C.

And how popular is python, compared to other languages?

Look at the TIOBE index.